Broken
by CharlotteBlackwood
Summary: Claire had been the punching bag of her parents for both her rebellion and that of her brother. Audrey had lived a charmed life. The war turned everything they knew and loved upside down. This is their story. RL/OC, SB/OC, JP/LE Non-explicit rape
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Never thought I'd do this, but I read this fabulous story today, so here we are, writing the most ridiculously anti-my-principles fan fic you could EVER imagine. This is going to start out Marauder's Era, but if it catches on and I decide not to go canon, I might do a sequel in the book years, maybe even go into post-war if it really catches on. So, just a tip here, I own nothing, Claire and Sirius are twins, and Audrey is James's little sister, one year younger. This story is little more than a half-baked idea in my brain, which is my least-favorite starting point, but here we go!**

**-J**

Claire rolled over and frowned, looking around the room she had woken up in. This was not her bedroom. This was bigger than her bedroom, brighter, without all of her Muggle band posters that Sirius had helped her permanently stick on her walls. And yet, that was her trunk in the corner, her shirt hanging off the edge of the bed, her pillow beneath her head.

Ah, yes. The Potters. She didn't sleep in her room anymore. She wasn't welcome at home anymore. She lived at James and Audrey's house because she and her brother had run away from home last December and were henceforth disowned.

Claire Black as a twin, a sixteen-year-old girl with a twin brother named Sirius, and she was second oldest by only two minutes and thirteen seconds. Still, Sirius never hesitated to rub it all in. They were oddballs in their family, Gryffindors. Her parents had resented that, and since had treated the pair of them as less than human, not like their "perfect" little brother, Regulus.

When she had been younger, Claire had been her father's little princess, his favorite child, and her mother's pride and joy, forced into constant competition with her cousins, Bellatrix, Andromeda, and Narcissa. When she was eleven, however, that all changed. She and Sirius were Sorted into Gryffindor, made friends with blood traitors, half-bloods, and Mudbloods, and refused to follow the family line on important issues such as blood purity and wizard supremacy. Home had become hell, a prison, and for Claire especially, the most terrifying, painful place in the world.

Sirius had sworn to protect her, but there was only so much he could do, and she hid a lot of things to protect him. They were both impulsive, which was somewhat of a family trait, and she knew the second he found out the half of it he would do something rash, something that would probably only make things worse. So for years, she hid the worst of her pain, the worst of her fears, for the sake of sparing Sirius a beating or two. After all, he was the heir, and there was only so much suffering they were willing to inflict on him.

Claire, on the other hand, was expendable. Yes, they wanted to marry her off to a well-chosen family, like the Malfoys or the Lestranges or the Selwyns, but as long as she looked pretty when all was said and done, she would marry fine. If she died, it wasn't really a hardship, and it meant no dowry was necessary. So when they really wanted to punish Sirius but couldn't actually bring themselves to hurt him, they would verbally or physically hurt her in front of him. This tactic became increasingly common as they grew older.

That Christmas, Claire had been doing her best to avoid her parents. Sirius was moody. He had been in a fight with his best friends and things were very tense for him. Naturally, he said a lot of stupid things when they were home for Christmas, and he had to watch their mother shriek at Claire, berate her, belittle her, tell her what a failure she was, how ugly she was, how she was a complete and utter disgrace to the name of Black.

The real icing on the cake, however, happened that night. It wasn't the first time it had happened, but it was the first time Sirius had known about it. At four in the morning, after hearing her screams, her pleading, the sounds of slaps, their father's verbal abuse, the cries and groans of a different kind of abuse, Sirius walked into her room to find her huddled in a corner, her clothes torn and covered in blood, a swollen eye, and tears streaming down her cheek.

"This has happened before," he said softly. She nodded. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want you getting hurt," she sniffed. "He told me that if I went and complained to you, he would hurt you. He said if I told anyone, he would hurt you. I didn't want him to hurt you, Sirius."

"But he hurt _you_," Sirius said, the pain obvious in his voice. "Claire, we can't stay here. This can't keep happening. I can't take this anymore. Honestly, what's to stop this from permanently ending or damaging your life beyond repair next time? Come on. Pack your things. We're leaving tonight, while they're asleep."

"But where will we go?" she sobbed as he bent down to help her to her feet. She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her face into his shoulder as his arms held her tightly to him, cradling her, comforting her. She was terrified he would let go.

"The Potters," he whispered. "We're always welcome there, they said so before. Trust me, if they know what happened–"

"No," Claire snapped. "You're not telling them about this."

"Baby–"

"No. You can tell them Mother hit me, or Regulus and I got into a fight. I don't care how you explain away the physical marks. You can tell them about the verbal stuff, but you are not telling them about this."

"Love, he–"

"I know what he did," she whimpered. "Trust me; I know more than you what he did! I just what to forget about it, okay? If we're leaving, this is all in the past, okay? This is just a memory. I'm not ever going to talk about this again if I can help it, understood?"

She knew he wanted to protest, he wanted to make her take justice on their father, but he had always had a hard time telling her no, and it certainly didn't hurt her case that she had looked incredibly and completely pathetic in that moment.

They had gathered their things, snuck out of the house, and took the Knight Bus to Potter Manor in Godric's Hollow. Mrs. Potter and Audrey had been up talking and they took one look at Claire and insisted that the twins stay with the Potters indefinitely. When the boys woke up in the morning to find the Blacks with them, when the story the twins had agreed on had been given at breakfast, there were no objections. This was their new home.

Regulus had written Andromeda, who had written Claire. Their mother was supposedly heartbroken to find them gone the following morning. Claire wasn't sure how much of that she believed. Heartbroken that she had lost her heir? Perhaps. Heartbroken at the loss of her only daughter? Maybe. Heartbroken that Sirius and Claire in particular were no longer hers to control and manipulate? It was possible. Sirius thought that the only thing their parents missed was having them as their little slaves, particularly Claire. He was sure they missed breaking her down, claiming it was all in attempts to make her worthy of a proper marriage. Claire knew her father would miss them only for that, but there was a part of her that thought, in her own twisted way, their mother probably was a bit heartbroken.

After all, she had never laid a hand on Sirius and certainly didn't mistreat him at all if she could help it, even if she was incredibly angry with him. And even though she had sorely mistreated Claire, their mother did care for her daughter in a twisted sort of way, and would surely miss the opportunity to marry her off, train her for married life, and stack her up against her cousins. Their mother had always wanted a daughter, from the time she was little, their Uncle Alphard had told Claire once. Perhaps she wouldn't miss Claire in particular, but she would miss everything she had wanted Claire for, everything she had hoped Claire could be, could bring her.

Remembering were she was and why she was there, Claire rolled out of her new bed in her new room at her new home with the Potters, tossed her things into her trunk, and wandered down to breakfast, where Audrey, James, and Sirius were already sleepily stuffing toast and sausage into their mouths.

"I'm packed," she sighed, dropping into the chair beside James and piling sausage onto her plate. "I suppose you'll want me to pack your things as well, Sirius?"

"Nah, Audrey did it last night," he muttered through his toast. "We're all ready to go when Dad gets things loaded."

Claire smiled to herself. Audrey and Sirius would never admit it to themselves or anyone else, but they were probably going to get married someday. Sirius, of course, looked incredibly like Claire, with gray eyes, raven-black hair, and aristocratic, haughty good looks. Audrey, on the other hand, had her brother's hazel eyes, long, straight sandy brown hair, and the most honest, simple face anyone could ask for.

"All right, everybody," Mr. Potter called. "I'm going to get your trunks. You've got fifteen minutes to finish trunks and change and then we're going."

The four of them looked around at each other, shoved a bit more food in their mouths and then ran up to their rooms. Claire tossed on a pair of black jeans and one of her brother's Sex Pistols tees, ran her fingers roughly through her shaggy black hair, and slipped on a pair of trainers. Then she skipped down the hall to Audrey's room where her friend was standing in front of a walk-in closet, considering the options.

"Well?" she asked, sitting down on the bed.

"Very you, Claire," Audrey sighed. "You and your brother, I swear you just share a wardrobe between the two of you."

"Only shirts," Claire joked. It was almost true; they just passed band tees around between the two of them.

"Anyway," Audrey sighed, "have you seen my blue jumper? I was going to wear it on the train."

Claire winced. If she remembered correctly, that blue jumper had been stretched out considerably by her brother, which he used as a Quidditch kit a few days earlier in a little match between the boys.

"I'll go look for it, you wait here."

Audrey continued sifting through her dresses and Claire ran down the hall to where the boys were changing in James's room.

"Boys," she called, pushing her way in, "blue jumper that you guys ruined the other day? You need to fix it. Audrey's looking for it."

They exchanged worried looks and looked down at the stretched blue jumper they had hidden under James's bed.

"Right," Sirius muttered. "How do we undo this damage?"

"Know any laundry charms, love?" James muttered, pulling on his jeans. "Or something like that?"

"Nope," Claire laughed. "Well, I'm not sure if this will work… but…" she pointed her wand at the jumper and muttered, "_Reparo_."

The jumper returned to its usual shape and size and the boys clapped and cheered. She sighed with relief, snatching it up from the floor, giving Sirius a quick kiss on the cheek, and rushing off to Audrey's room, where she had on a light blue dress.

"Oh, you found it, thanks." Audrey pulled on the jumper and frowned. "It smells like your brother."

Claire froze, thinking fast.

"Ah, yeah, it was in some of his stuff that I borrowed. Smell probably spread. Is that bad?"

"Not exactly," Audrey laughed, "but I hope some of his crazier fan girls don't attack me. I'd hate to be mauled because you and your brother can't figure out how to have your own clothes."

At King's Cross, Mr. Potter pushed his daughter's trolley and Sirius piled Claire's things on his own and they made their way onto platform nine and three-quarters. The boys carried the trunks onto the train and Claire heard someone calling her name. She turned and saw Regulus with their parents down the platform. Her father was watching her, leering at her, and she turned away, searching for her twin as her father and brother worked their way up the platform. Audrey was with her parents, saying her goodbyes. Sirius and James were nowhere to be seen, probably still securing the trunks. Her heart began to race.

Just as her father reached her, Remus and Sirius came off the train and walked back toward where she was, Sirius with a vicious look on his face.

"Claire," Regulus said, "father found you a match. You don't have to leave, you know. Rabastan is willing to marry you after you graduate if you promise to come home on the breaks again."

"She's not going back," Sirius hissed, wrapping his arms protectively around Claire, "so you can forget the engagement. She's suffered enough at your hand, _father_. I'm not leaving her alone in that house for another second."

"Hi, Remus," she muttered at her brother's friend. "Good summer?"

"The same as always," he said, watching her father watch her. "Have you seen Lily?"

She shook her head, burrowing deeper into Sirius's arms.

"This offer won't be open forever, Claire," her father drawled. "Rabastan promises to provide for you, despite your rebelliousness, and you would have your cousin nearby. This is the best option."

"No," she whispered, gripping Sirius's jacket, noting that her hands were shaking slightly.

"What did you just say?"

"She said no," Mr. Potter said, walking up behind Sirius and Remus. "If you wouldn't mind, Orion, I'd like to say goodbye to the twins without you breathing down their necks and making her uncomfortable."

Claire was sure her father was about to cause a scene, but very few people had the guts to take on the Potters publically, and apparently her father was included in the majority, so he turned, led Regulus back to their mother, and allowed Mr. Potter to say goodbye to Sirius and Claire unencumbered.

"If Regulus gives her any trouble, you write me," Mr. Potter told Sirius. "Anything at all, you let me know."

Mr. Potter didn't know the full extent of the abuse, of course, but he was a wise man and knew enough to know that Claire wasn't likely to cower in fear over a simple smack or two across the face. Sirius nodded and led his sister onto the train, down the carriage about halfway to the compartment James and Peter had settled into.

"I've got to go to the meeting," Remus said, "but I'll see you all in a bit and you can explain what just happened."

"Tell Lily-flower I said hello!" James exclaimed as Remus left the compartment, but Remus just shook his head and gave a tight smile as he closed the door behind him. Claire settled on her brother's lap, arms tight around his neck, her face buried in his chest.

"Well, we all know who James is after this year," Sirius said. "What about you, Pete? Got your eye on a girl?"

Peter blushed and nodded, but refused to say who. Claire had an inkling that it was Audrey, but she didn't say a word. Peter was teased enough for just being himself. He didn't need the extra agony of being completely smitten with James's baby sister.

"What about you, Padfoot?" James asked. "Who's the girl this year?"

"You mean, who's the first girl this year?" Claire joked. "Honestly, Sirius I'd be more impressed if you set a goal like having a steady girl or being completely single, no flings or strings."

"Single it is, baby," he whispered, kissing her forehead. "But you, my dear, I want to see with a steady, loving boyfriend by the end of the year, and that's an order."

Claire frowned.

"What?"

"Don't tell me you haven't noticed!" Sirius gasped, sharing a look of surprise with James.

"Noticed what?"

"But he's practically in love with you!" James whispered intensely.

"Who?"

"Sweet Merlin, she's clueless," Sirius sighed. "Our dear Moony is absolutely head-over-heels about you, love. It's about time you two discovered that you're destined for each other and started snogging each other silly. I suspect there's a wild beast underneath his good-boy exterior that could give you quite a good time."

Claire glared at Sirius, shook her head, and buried her face in his chest once more. Despite her denial that anything was there, she ran through her mind memories of Remus. Once or twice, she had caught him watching her in class, seen him stare at her across the common room. It wasn't a look she would expect from someone like Remus, not the curious interest or concern she might have thought would be there, but the more she thought on it, the more she remembered the hunger in his amber colored eyes, always more so near the full moon, which was why she had written it off as nothing in the past.

Was Sirius right? Was there some part of Remus, or even some part of the wolf, that actually desired her? And if that was the case, did she want him back? Claire had never thought of Remus in that way, but she knew perfectly well that he was handsome. The scars on his face were interesting, his eyes held pain that she had always felt she could find kinship in, and the soft, hoarseness of his voice, the vulnerability and yet absolute feral strength he sometimes possessed… She nearly shivered.

But after her ordeal, after what had occurred a mere month ago, was she even ready to start thinking about relationships and boys? She was broken, damaged, and a boy like Remus deserved so much more than she had to give.

No, whether Sirius was right or wrong, she had no business pursuing that boy. That much was clear.


	2. You May Be Right

The way Claire had looked at her father, the way her father had looked at Claire, had made the wolf stir in Remus, protective, angry, and hungry. He couldn't be sure what had occurred between them, and Sirius and Claire weren't saying, but if it was anything like what Remus thought it was, he wanted nothing more than to capture Orion Black, gouge out the man's eyes, remove every body part that had been involved in the act, and then leave him to bleed out and revel in his own pain. It was too kind a death for a man cowardly enough to attack his own daughter, but it was the best justice Remus could dream up.

It was impossible not to feel a bit protective of Claire Black. She didn't admit it, but she wasn't as strong as she would like everyone to believe. Remus had been around her long enough to know that she was naturally shy and very broken up inside. Her boisterous persona was all a front to hide her inward fears and insecurities. He had seen her sneak into Sirius's bed ever since their first year, seen Sirius hold her, pet her, calm her, and rock her to sleep. He had known Sirius was fiercely loyal and a great friend from his own dealings with Sirius, but after watching Sirius with Claire there wasn't a doubt in his mind that Sirius would do anything for his twin.

The details of the twins' home life before running away the previous winter were fuzzy and unelaborated. Remus knew Claire hated going home, that she tended to jump whenever anyone but Sirius touched her, and that she had actually lashed out at some bloke who had tried coming on to her at a party that spring. The bloke latter had the shit beat out of him by Sirius, James, and Remus, but he probably was shaken up enough by Claire's vicious outburst.

But it had been harder and harder to keep boys away from Claire, despite her full group of bodyguards, also known as the Marauders, because she had blossomed incredibly during their fourth year, which was about the time Sirius's crazed fan girls had begun to organize, as well. She had his shaggy, dark hair, his haughty face, and his swirling gray eyes, but she was different, obviously. Remus would never have admitted it out loud, but he liked to watch her body, her chest, her bum, her legs… and he wasn't the only boy looking. She also had all sorts of habits, as well, like chewing on her fingernails that he knew she was trying to break, but she wasn't very good at beating them. Remus didn't mind. She was so adorable when she was mad at herself.

That night, the boys sat up, discussing girls, as always.

"Did she talk about me, Moony?" James pressed, and Remus shook his head, giving his friend a sympathetic smile.

"Sorry, Prongs. She didn't say a word, and when someone did bring you up she got a look on her face like she wanted to vomit. No luck there, mate."

In truth, Lily had gone on a rant about how detestable James was, but Remus felt it wasn't particularly kind to mention that to his already heartbroken friend. James would bounce back in a few hours and be fine to stalk her again in the morning, but too much at once when he was getting back in the swing of things would have been cruel on Remus's part.

"Claire missed you over the summer, Remus," Sirius said slyly. "Kept complaining that she didn't have anyone to discuss Muggle books with. Personally, I think she just missed looking at your ugly mug."

Remus blushed. Had she really said that? He wanted her to miss him, to think about him when he wasn't around, but he wasn't like James and Sirius. Remus Lupin was forgettable. He had been too afraid to make an impact, to be remembered when he first came to school, but his friends had beaten most of his self-loathing out of him. Still.

He was dangerous, it was true, but as Sirius had taken to pointing out and hinting, Remus had become so much more manageable, so much more human, now that he had his friends with him on the full moons, and Claire didn't mind that he was a werewolf. After so long of debating with himself, Remus found he was nearly ready to admit that being with Claire would be worth the risks. But would Claire think he was worth the risk? That was the tricky bit.

"I'm sure Claire had a wonderful time without me," Remus muttered. "She certainly has better company than me around all of the time."

It was true. Claire was constantly with Sirius, James, and Audrey, three of the four most popular people in school. Granted, Sirius was her brother, so she might not always want to be with him, and Audrey was really only popular because she was related to James and a Gryffindor Quidditch player, but what mattered was that the four were rarely seen without at least one of the other with them, and when people talked of the four rulers of the school, people often had to ask whether they were referring to the Marauders or the top two Marauders and their sisters. There wasn't much competing with company like that.

"Nonsense, Remus," James said with a laugh. "Sirius is right, Claire likes you as well as any of us… Better than Peter, I think."

Peter frowned.

"Sorry, Pete," Sirius said with a sharp bark of laughter. "She thinks your devotion is a tad creepy."

She wasn't wrong, Remus thought, but he understood where Peter was coming from. To be accepted in such a group was the stuff of dreams, and for Remus and Peter, they had never dared have such glorious dreams. To find themselves in the Marauders, even after all these years, was a lovely dream that Remus was sure he would wake up from someday.

"It doesn't matter what I think of her or what she thinks of me," Remus whispered. "Someone like me has got no business pursuing a steady girl, much less someone as special as Claire. She deserves the best, Sirius, you know that. I can't give her anything she deserves."

Sirius scoffed.

"What are you referring to, Remus? The fact that you're a beast once a month? She knows that, and she doesn't care. She's still your friend, isn't she?"

"Friend is one thing, what you're asking is a completely different situation," Remus argued.

"No, it's not," Sirius snapped. "If you're talking about the money, she doesn't need it. Claire and I have both seen what wealth and power can do to people, and we're not keen to go back. You're a smart guy, Remus. Even if you aren't able to provide for her how you would like, you ought to know she's more than capable of providing for the both of you. Even if she doesn't, she wouldn't mind having a hard go of things. Claire's not some spoiled little princess, you know." His eyes darkened. "Not anymore."

Remus shuddered a little at that. It was true, when he first met Claire, she was the absolute queen of the earth and anyone who thought differently had to be put in their place. She walked around with her nose in the air, her head held high, and the unmistakable air of someone who had been both spoiled rotten and taught from birth that they were the sun, moon, and stars and should be treated as such. And Remus had worshiped her.

But each successive holiday left her looking a little less majestic and a little more broken than she had been before, until last Christmas, when Remus had come back to learn that Sirius and Claire had run away from home after, as Sirius put it, "Father did something so horrible Claire refuses to let me speak of it." And Remus still worshiped her, but instead of worshiping, wanting to fall at her feet and kiss the very ground she walked on, Remus wanted to hold her, cradle her, and make all the pain disappear.

She was no longer the majestic princess demanding the sun, moon, and stars. She was a broken little angel who had been beaten into the dirt until she had cried tears of blood, and her very presence demanded pity, compassion, and love. And Remus loved her more than he could say.

"And as far as the stigma you think she'd have for being with someone like you, well, she's a little runaway, isn't she?" Sirius sighed. "What sort of a stigma do you think she'll have anyway?"

Sirius was right about that. Rumors had already made their way around the school about Claire. Once someone made a bold move like she and Sirius did, the way people looked at them changed. Sirius was more loved for it, a rebel, a rugged, tough individual who didn't stand for being pushed around. Claire was still adored, obviously, because of her company, but it didn't stop the whispers.

Whore. Prostitute. Slut.

They were all wrong, all lies, and everyone knew it, but Remus supposed it made some of the other girls feel better about themselves to think that was all Claire, the absolute goddess she was, would only ever amount to a whore.

"All she needs is someone who is going to love her and care for her and respect her," Sirius whispered. "There's nobody on this planet who can do any of that better than you, Moony. I already know you absolutely adore her, and I want what's best for my baby sister. Trust me, there's not a boy who's better for the job. And I know you'll make her happy."

"I don't deserve her," Remus countered weakly.

"No one does," James chuckled. "Even I know that. But you're as close as it's going to get, and that's something we can all agree on. We already know you love the girl, Moony. Stop being so stubborn and selfish. Can't you see she needs you?"

"Don't say that," Remus snapped. "She doesn't need me. She needs Sirius. I'm not her brother."

"I'm flattered," Sirius said dryly, "but the fact of the matter is that I can't and won't be around to pick her up forever. I've got my own life, and she's not going to want me to babysit her. She needs to stand on her own two feet. I'm hesitant to let her, and she's going to need help."

"But not me," Remus said weakly.

"Actually," Sirius said with a small smile, "you're exactly what she needs. Now you two need to figure it out."

The following morning, Remus couldn't help but watch Claire at breakfast. Her pretty black hair flowed around her face, framing her aristocratic cheekbones. It fell into her face just a bit, and he fought the urge to lean across the table and brush it out of her sparkling gray eyes.

"You all right, Moony?" she said with a concerned sort of smile. "You look a bit out of sorts."

"Just a little tired," he said sharply. "Didn't get much sleep last night."

"That's too bad," she remarked, helping herself to more sausage. "Good morning, Audrey!" she said brightly as James's sister sat down beside Claire, smiling sleepily. "How was your night?"

"It was just like any other night," Audrey said with a shrug. "You know me, I just don't like being told when I have to wake up."

Audrey was very pretty too, Remus said to himself, but not in the obvious way Claire was. Audrey was honest, almost a bit plain, but the true beauty in her was her ever-present smile and the sparkle in her eyes. Sirius slid into the seat beside Remus.

"Where's James?" he muttered, piling sausages onto his plate.

"Shower," Remus said as he sipped his pumpkin juice.

"Merlin, he's like a girl," Sirius growled. "No offense, ladies."

Sirius winked at the girls, and Claire rolled her eyes, but Remus couldn't help but notice that Audrey blushed a little bit. Girls did that when Sirius smiled or winked at them, and some of them visibly swooned if he did both at once. Remus couldn't help but wonder if Sirius learned the skill somewhere or if he was just a natural.

There was some amount of learning involved, he decided, because Sirius only seemed to get better at it as he got older, but the fact that Claire had a similar effect on boys told Remus that they were at least born with a basic ability.

As the day went on, Remus found himself watching Claire more and more, aware of Sirius and James watching him do so. He was aware of all of her movements, all of her conversations, every little time she so much as exhaled more forcefully than usual. The words from the night before bounced around in his mind. He didn't deserve her, that was still true, but he did want her very, very much, and he seemed to have her brother's blessing. In fact, her brother was practically begging Remus to make some sort of move.

The problem was Remus wouldn't know what to do. Maybe she would be happier with someone who knew what to do, knew how to treat a girl like her.

And then when he walked into the Great Hall at dinner, he spotted Claire dishing up her food and speaking with a Ravenclaw seventh year boy who was very clearly flirting with her. Remus had never felt so much like he wanted to rip out someone's throat on such an innocuous part of the moon cycle, but that Ravenclaw boy was unknowingly flirting with danger as well. Remus could feel his blood boiling, and the wolf in him wanted to rip the boy limb from limb for even looking at Claire like that. He turned to Sirius, who seemed very aware of Remus's reaction to the scene and was actually smirking at the aggressive look in Remus's eye.

"I need your help."

"Oh?" Sirius said, amused. "And what would it be that you need?"

"I need you to teach me how to woo your sister," Remus snarled, "because she's mine. It's about time people knew that."

"It's about time you figured it out," Sirius snorted. "Yeah, all right, we'll work on your flirtation and stuff, but you have to promise me that a week from now, no matter how much progress we've made, you'll ask her out."

Remus felt the fear and uncertainty sinking into his stomach, but he turned his eyes back to the smarmy Ravenclaw who was trying to make Claire laugh and it set his resolve.

"Of course."

"Right then," Sirius said with a smile, "you've got yourself a deal!"

Remus hadn't realized that he'd effectively signed up for romantic boot camp. Sirius had never taken much in life very seriously, but Remus felt as though he was being drilled worse than Professor McGonagall in N.E.W.T. level Transfiguration. They went over how to talk to a girl, how to look at a girl, how to ask a girl out, how to kiss a girl, and the whole day before Remus had to ask Claire out Sirius was lecturing him on the ins and outs of a quality sexual experience.

"This is really important with Claire," Sirius added, "you need to move slowly in the physical realm, make sure she's comfortable. I know the wolf might make that hard sometimes, but you've got to be extra vigilant, or not only will you lose her but I will rip you up into tiny pieces and feed you to the giant squid. Are we clear?"

Remus had agreed, although he wasn't sure exactly why this was so important with Claire. After all, she and Sirius were so alike he would have thought that she would move as fast as her brother. He had been worried she'd expect Remus to move faster than he was comfortable with, but instead Sirius was suggesting that Remus might be the one making her uncomfortable.

The night before the day of reckoning, Remus lay awake, staring at the ceiling. He wondered what was going to happen, how his life might change, the following day. His thoughts were interrupted, however, by the sound of someone slipping into the dormitory. Claire.

She slid into her brother's bed and Remus watched her shake him awake, noticing that she was shaking a little and covered in sweat.

"Sirius?" she whimpered, and Remus felt his heart clench at the pathetic sound of her voice. "Sirius?"

Sirius shifted a little and sat up.

"Baby?" he muttered, wrapping his arms around her. "Hey, hey, shh, come here. It's going to be okay. I'm right here. Come on, get under the covers."

Remus felt a little awkward, feeling like he was intruding on a private moment, but he couldn't help but watch and listen.

"Tell me about it, baby," Sirius whispered, stroking his sister's hair. "It's good to get it off your chest."

"I – I just keep seeing him, seeing his face as he's hitting me, as he's… Sirius, I think I'm scared of the dark now. Every time the lights go out I think I see him in the shadows. Am I going mad?"

"No, love," Sirius whispered, hugging her tightly. "Absolutely not. You had horrible stuff happen to you. You've handled it better than most because you're strong. But he can't hurt you anymore, baby. I'm never letting him touch you again."

Remus watched as Sirius soothed and calmed her, holding her tightly as she began to relax enough to fall asleep in his arms. Remus could see Sirius watching him in the dark. Sirius knew that Remus knew, and they simply watched each other until they were too tired to keep their eyes opened. Remus dreamed that night of holding Claire, of kissing away her nightmares and fears and fixing her.


	3. Breakthrough

Claire woke up in her brother's arms, as she had many times since running away from home. She felt safer there, and it was really the only place in the world she was able to sleep peacefully. The dreams had gotten worse, she thought, despite the fact that she had had months to move on. Sirius had pressured her to talk to Madam Pomfrey, to at least say she was having nightmares and takes something for them, but she refused. She knew he was concerned about her health, and she tried to deal with her fears on her own as much as possible, but it felt as though she was drowning in them.

Before running away from home, she knew Sirius had a different girl in his bed every other day, definitely a new girl every weekend. In a way, she felt guilty for requiring his attention and time, but on the other hand, it was probably better for the mental health of all the other girls that she was so needy all of a sudden. He didn't have time or energy to break hearts when he was keeping Claire from falling apart.

She carefully detracted herself from his hold, making her way to the bathroom the boys shared, attached to their dormitory. She had become a regular visitor, so she had her own space for her things, and they gave her plenty of privacy. It stopped being weird to share their space very quickly.

Looking in the mirror, Claire could see the lines on her face, lines that were from the stress and fear that had found its way onto her face since she had started at school. It didn't seem fair that her brother spent his time laughing and grinning when she had frown lines that deepened with every night of sleep, when she even managed to get sleep. She set about washing her face when she heard the door open. Claire pretended not to notice as the person behind her watched her bend over the sink, which was her first clue that it wasn't her brother. Sirius would have teased her, not stared at her ass.

Straightening up and drying her face, Claire snuck a glance at the mirror and saw Remus watching her with a hungry expression that made her feel a pleasant burning sensation in her core. His eyes met hers in the mirror and he blushed furiously.

"Sorry," he muttered, "I hadn't realized… I mean… I'll leave you alone."

"Don't be stupid, Remus," she said with a laugh. "I'm just washing my face. You're allowed to use your own bathroom. It's not like I'm taking a shower or something."

"Well, I was going to, but…"

"Go ahead!" Claire insisted, not sure if she wanted him to back away or take her invitation. "I'm not stopping you."

He blushed and nodded, probably thinking it would be rude to refuse. Claire watched through the mirror as he peeled of his shirt, fighting her intake of breath as she took in the sight of his muscled, scarred skin. Being a werewolf had certainly done him a few favors. By the time he dropped his pajama pants and had his fingers on the waistline of his boxers, Claire was watching without any cover of washing her face, biting her lip to keep in the moan as she raked his naked body with her eyes.

His back was turned to her, but she was determined to see the front, so she quickly dried her face, walked up behind him, and whispered in his ear, "See, was that so bad?"

She managed to sneak a look over his shoulder, smirking as he blushed wildly at how suddenly close she was, but she was perfectly happy with her view, although it would have been better if he had turned around, but she would take what she got.

It became a bit of a tradition with them, spending time in the bathroom in the mornings, but not until after the next week, when Claire actually was taking a shower. Despite the fact that she was incredibly shy physically, to the point that if James touched her arm she would scream, Claire found she didn't mind when Remus accidentally walked in on her and watched her through the translucent shower door. Although she had been nearly done, when she realized he was staring at the outline of her body, she decided to wash both her body and her hair one more time each, giving him a good fifteen minute show. Then, in a bold move, Claire opened the shower door completely, swiftly, and without turning off the water, not giving him a chance to sneak away, and said, "Can you hand me a towel, Remus?"

The shade of red he turned was unbelievable.

After several weeks of watching each other less than sneakily, Claire decided to make a move. He had gotten up before her that morning, although she had been awake for an hour, just waiting, and Claire waited for the sound of the shower going to crawl out of bed. He never took very long in the shower. She waited outside the door until the water went off, gave him enough time to put on a towel and turn on the sink, brushing his teeth, before marching into the bathroom like it was nothing.

At this point, it practically was.

"Morning, Remus," she said, noting that he hadn't actually put his toothbrush in his mouth, but was watching the mirror from the moment she opened the door, toothbrush poised, waiting for her to begin to strip. But she wasn't stripping this morning. She walked right up behind him and began tracing the many scars on his back.

"Morning," he said, frowning a little in confusion. "What are you doing, Claire?"

"Now, here I was thinking we didn't ask questions in this room," she joked. "Silly me, I guess."

Before he could say anything else, she placed a kiss on the spot where his shoulder met his neck, but not a chaste kiss… an open-mouthed kiss, with a bit of a lick and a nibble.

That was how it started. Nothing else in their lives changed, but nearly every morning, Claire and Remus found themselves snogging out all of their pent-up frustrations in the bathroom. She wasn't sure it would go anywhere beyond that, but the feel of him holding her against the wall, his tongue searching her mouth or his lips trailing slowly down her neck made her melt like butter. She was grateful, however, that he only explored her body with his eyes, not his hands. She wasn't sure she could have handled that, despite how good she knew it would feel.

After about a month, Claire found herself pressed hard against the wall, just beside the door, running her hands up and down Remus's bare chest and doing her absolute best not to moan in his mouth, because there was no way of knowing how close to waking up the other boys were. She wrapped her legs around his waist, dug her fingernails into his back, and arched her neck to give his mouth access to it, glad that he went no lower than her collarbone, as much as her body ached for him to continue his descent.

Suddenly, the door swung open, letting in the cold air to the hot, steamy room, and Sirius said, "Hey, when are you going to be – holy shit!"

Claire would have slid down to the floor, but she knew Remus's towel would have it the floor with her and he would have turned a deeper shade of red than he already was.

"Good morning, Sirius," she said, a bit breathier than she would have liked. "Erm… Did you need the shower or something?"

"What I need is to have a little chat with my baby sister," Sirius hissed. "Remus, want to give us a minute?"

Remus carefully helped Claire to the ground and slipped out to the dormitory as fast as his feet could carry him. Sirius slipped inside and locked the door, frowning.

"Why didn't you tell me you've been getting hot and sweaty with Remus?" he insisted, a small smirk forming on his face.

"It's not like that," she muttered, feeling her own blush form. "It's just kissing, letting off steam…"

"He's really into you, love," Sirius said. "What are you going to say if he asks you out? What are you going to do if he tries to touch you? He may be a gentleman, but he's also male, and a male with the appetites of a werewolf. There's only so long he's going to be able to stay on this level without snapping."

Claire bit her lip and sunk to the floor, tears falling down her face as she thought of her father, her father's hands, his mouth… But Remus wasn't her father… So why did the thought of Remus touching her make her shake with fear?

"Shh," Sirius sighed, sitting beside her and wrapping his arms around her and hugging her tightly. "It's all right, baby. You're going to be okay. I've got you, darling. Shh."

Claire clung to her brother, shaking against his chest. He was going to ask her to see Madam Pomfrey again. She knew it.

"You need to talk to somebody, baby," he muttered in her ear. "Someone other than me."

"I'm not talking to Madam Pomfrey," she sniffed. "I've told you dozens of times."

"I was thinking of someone else," he whispered, smoothing her hair gently and smiling down at her. Smiling, not smirking. She hadn't seen him smile at her like that since they were children. "Why don't you tell Remus?"

She blinked. Was he actually telling her that telling a prefect, someone required to report that sort of thing, what happened at her house, in her room, where Sirius couldn't protect her? The very idea seemed outrageous, but Sirius seemed perfectly sincere about it. Did she need to tell someone? Absolutely. But shouldn't it be someone without a responsibility to tell someone else?

"He's a good boy, Sirius," she sighed. "He'll tell someone, thinking he's helping me, and then they'll hunt me down and kill me, or worse…"

Claire wasn't sure what Sirius thought worse was, but she knew what would happen. They would find Sirius, and they would hurt him, maybe even kill him, because nothing would hurt her more. Besides, he wasn't the heir anymore. They didn't need him looking pretty, or even alive. They did, however, need to keep their dirty little secrets under the rug, no matter what they had to do to keep Claire quiet.

"He won't say anything, baby," Sirius insisted. "We keep his secrets. Why should he tell yours?"

"The teachers know about his secrets," Claire hissed. "Dumbledore knows."

"Dumbledore probably knows about yours too," Sirius reasoned. "He knows everything."

"_Then why didn't he save me?_" she whimpered. "Why didn't he do anything? How could he let them take me?"

The two pairs of gray eyes met, held a pained gaze. In that moment, she remembered every slap, every slice, every time her mother bashed Claire's head against the wall. She remembered everything she ever said when begging for her safety, for her life, for them to leave her alone. She promised so many things, but they knew she didn't mean a word of it, or they would have tried to hold her to them, maybe even stopped hurting her. She had agreed to six different marriage proposals while being beaten. She had promised to stop being friends with Audrey four times while her mother slashed her back with a whip. She had sworn never to speak to anyone in Gryffindor ever again twice while Regulus hit her under the watchful eyes of their parents. She had promised never to even think about a boy her parents didn't approve of twelve times while her father held her down and made her scream. He liked the screaming. But it never meant anything, and everyone knew it. The one thing she never promised was to abandon Sirius, because he was the one thing she would never give up.

It was also the one thing that might have made them stop.

They knew she was the weak one. Sirius could defy them with a smile. Claire did it with a shaking voice. Maybe it was because she knew the blows were coming and Sirius knew they may not, maybe it was because she was just born weaker, but either way, she was the weak one, the one they thought they could turn into a compliant child if they just hit her hard enough.

Regulus learned by example. Claire, they thought, needed a hands-on approach.

She had calmed down enough that she had stopped shaking, and Sirius said, "Promise me you'll think about it, okay? And I'll just knock before opening the door next time, all right?"

"Sounds like a plan," she said, with no intentions of thinking about it, and she sprang to her feet, but Sirius stood quickly between her and the door.

"I mean it, Claire," he whispered. "You really need to consider this. I can't protect you forever, baby. I want to. You know that. If I could spend the rest of my life at your side keep you happy and safe and comforted I would do it in a heartbeat, but I just can't do that. We've got to live our own lives. I'll always be here for you, but you need other people on your side, and if there's anyone I know who can and would give everything to keep you safe, happy, and comforted, it's Remus. But you already know this. You don't need me telling you."

Claire nodded.

He was right, of course. He usually was, when he was talking about someone else's life. That was one of Sirius's biggest problems. He was able to clearly see what everyone else needed to do in their lives, but he was a bit of a hypocrite in his own right. He meant well, truly. He wasn't being selfish about it. Things were just different for him. Because of their childhoods, their time with their family, his eyes had been opened very fast to the right and wrong of the world, and he was actually a very good judge of it. But when it came to himself, he acted on impulse, typically to protect Claire or out of reaction to something that had happened to Claire. He would have hated their mother anyway, and their father, but after what they had done to Claire he would have killed them if he'd had the chance, even though for any other situation he would say getting away and forgiving from a distance was the right thing to do.

Claire didn't blame him. Forgiving wasn't something she thought she'd ever be able to do.

Forgetting was impossible.

But that was partly Sirius's fault. She knew she ought to talk about things. But she didn't want to. She wanted to forget everything, but Sirius made her talk, although they never said the words outright. They didn't have to.

Claire noticed that Remus was not in the dormitory when she reentered it. He was embarrassed at being caught and didn't want to face… who? Her? Sirius? Both of them?

She suddenly realized that she might have blown it, blown any chance with Remus, by forcing it to be a hidden thing, by making him shy and nervous about it, as if it was something to be ashamed of. It was then that she understood that she wanted a chance with Remus, something more substantive than snogging in a steamy bathroom for half an hour in the mornings, something that didn't involve pretending everything was the same as usual in every other place but that one room. But she was sure it would never happen now.

Quietly, Claire snuck out of the boys' dormitory, up the stairs to the girls' dormitories, and into the room that held Audrey, and all the other girls in Audrey's year. She quietly slipped into Audrey's bed, closed the curtains, and put up a charm so as not to wake the other girls before shaking her best friend awake.

"Claire?" Audrey moaned. "What is it?"

"I need to talk to you," Claire whispered, her face in her hands to hide the tears already rolling down her face. "I need to tell you everything."

"What are you talking about?"

"I need to tell you what happened, why we had to run away… I need to tell someone other than Sirius or I'll go mad, but you have to promise me something."

Audrey sat up and frowned at her.

"Anything."

"I need you to promise not to tell anyone you know any of this except Sirius. This is only to be discussed with Sirius and myself, and you absolutely can't speak of it in the actual terms of what truly happened at any time other than this conversation. Are we clear?"

"Crystal," Audrey breathed. "Claire, are you okay?"

For the first time in a long time, she paused at that question and looked up at her friend. She got that question a lot, whether in greeting, from Sirius, from Lily or Audrey… but in that moment… she didn't want to lie again.

"No," she sobbed, not covering her tears. "No, I'm not okay."

Audrey held Claire and they cried together as Claire told her everything that had happened, every detail of the time in Grimmauld Place from the time she turned eleven, including the night she and Sirius had run away from home.

"So that bruise on your face was from your father?" Audrey whispered. "Oh, Claire, I'm so sorry! Why haven't you told anyone?"

"They said if I ever told, they'd hurt Sirius," Claire whimpered. "I can't let them hurt Sirius, Audrey, I can't!"

"Why are you telling me this now, though?" Audrey frowned. "I mean, I'm glad you told me. And I think you needed to. But why now?"

So Claire explained the less-than-relationship with Remus, being walked in on by Sirius, and everything than ensued from there.

"I think I've really blown it," Claire muttered, picking at a loose string on the duvet. "I think I'm doomed to be alone forever."

"No," Audrey insisted firmly. "Even if you don't have Remus, you'll always have me." She paused thoughtfully. "I realize that's not quite the same thing" – they both giggled – "but it's something, anyway. No kissing, of course, but I'll always be here when you need me. And we could probably grow old together. No boy's ever going to want me."

"Don't be absurd, Audrey," Claire tutted. "You're just looking in the wrong places, waiting for the dumb ones. The right boy will come around, love. I promise."

"Then so will yours," Audrey said with a sympathetic smile.


	4. Like a Dream

As horrified as Remus had been to have been walked in on snogging Claire, by her brother, no less, he couldn't get the thought of her taste, of her touch, off his mind. Their stolen moments in the mornings had become his favorite part of the day, and he often spent all of the rest of the day thinking about it.

Sirius hadn't seemed upset, Remus reasoned, merely surprised. Likely, Sirius would merely have a talk with Claire, decide how she felt about things, and then either give his blessing or not. But Sirius had already given his blessing, hadn't he? In telling Remus to pursue Claire, there was an obvious blessing, or at least an implicit one.

But was pursing Claire the right thing to do? It certainly felt right, holding her against the wall, his tongue down her throat, her perfect hands against his chest… But things that felt right weren't always good. After all, once a month his body felt right in devouring weak and innocent creatures, especially humans… right wasn't always right.

How had he even allowed himself to get to this point? She had lured him into positions he couldn't turn down, teased him mercilessly until his will was gone, and then when she kissed him… it simply wasn't fair. Remus ought to have said no, to have gone about his desires in a proper, measured fashion, but Claire… she was just too much. She knew it, too. She knew she was too beautiful, too sensual, too enticing for her own good. Sirius and Claire had that in common.

It hadn't escaped his notice, however, the scars that lined her body. She didn't have the excuse he did of lycanthropy. He knew she typically used glamour to cover up the thing lines, the deep scars, but when she was with him, for some reason, she neglected them. He was able to see every former gash, slice… When Sirius said they had lived in hell, Remus had never quite realized just how bad it had been, especially for Claire. He knew she wasn't likely to explain, but it made him want her more, want to hold and protect her from the world. Especially, from her father.

It was odd, as Remus thought back, never had Claire or Sirius ever mentioned their father proliferating any sort of punishment or abuse. Their mother, certainly, and in Claire's case, even Regulus was guilty of some of the horrible things that had happened. But their father… he had been mysteriously absent from the tales. Yet on platform nine and three-quarters, Claire had looked at her father with such fear in her eyes that Remus was sure there must have been something…

Remus's mind ran back to the view of her body… and the deep-looking scars on her thighs. They were clearly caused by some sort of Dark Magic… but Remus couldn't think of how they got there. From what Sirius said, it wasn't their mother's style, and Remus wasn't fairly certain Regulus wouldn't have had access to that part of her body… so that left… her father.

When the significance of what might have and probably did happen, the wolf reared up inside Remus and wanted to tear her father apart, to strangle the man with his own intestines.

He went about his day, watching Claire and unable to help but think that she looked even more beautiful than usual, and that it just wasn't fair. Remus was finding it more and more difficult to act as though everything in his life was normal and that he didn't want to toss Claire across the nearest desk and ravage her. The wolf purred at the thought.

That night at dinner, Remus ended up sitting next to Claire, which was all Sirius's fault and completely unfair. Every time his leg accidently rubbed against hers, he wanted to moan, and when he passed the salt down to Lily he turned and caught a whiff of Claire's scent. For a moment, he lost track of everything except her scent, and he wanted to reach out and draw her in closer to him. When James cleared his throat after Remus didn't answer a question James had posed, Remus was called back into the real world, but he didn't miss Sirius's knowing smirk.

Maybe Remus had a prayer… but would Claire even want him, or was she just messing around when she had made her advances? After all, she and her brother had a lot in common… was he just a conquest for the fun of things? If that was the case, Remus found he hardly even minded. If it meant he could kiss her again, he would do just about anything.

Remus found himself pacing the common room late into the night, after his patrol, trying to get his mind off of Claire, who he was sure was upstairs at that very moment, lying in her brother's arms and sleeping like a beautiful, peaceful angel. If he went upstairs, he would have to keep himself from jumping into that bed with them.

But before he could get himself put together, he saw a figure coming down the stairs. He watched her coming closer, her dressing gown falling off her shoulder to reveal a rather skimpy nightie. Knowing exactly what underneath that nightie, Remus couldn't help but shiver slightly as she approached. In the dying firelight, he could barely see her face, but he could tell she was watching him.

"I was waiting for you to come upstairs," she whispered, "but you never came. I got worried."

"I… I was just thinking."

It wasn't exactly a lie, but she didn't seem to think anything of it. Instead, she took him by the hand and led him to the couch. Sitting beside her and not doing anything felt wrong, almost unfair, but he thought it was even worse that her small, wonderful fingers were massaging his hand.

"I need to tell you something," she sighed. "Something that Sirius said I need to talk about. I – I thought he was wrong, but then I talked to Audrey, and he was right, of course. I felt a lot better. But… I need to tell you things, if you'll listen."

"Of course," he whispered, trying to remember everything Sirius had taught him about wooing girls, more specifically Claire.

"My dad… liked to hear me scream," she whispered. "It was one of his favorite things, actually, he said so several times. S-sometimes, he would come into my room at night and… and… hurt me. And he would make me scream, and make me do things I didn't want to do, and he would hit me and cut me, and one night… the night we ran away, he used Dark Magic and… I've never hurt so badly before in my life."

He could tell she was crying and without even thinking about it he wrapped his arms around her. She didn't have to say what had happened. Remus knew. Orion Black had raped his sixteen-year-old daughter. She sobbed into his chest for twenty minutes.

"I love you," he whispered as she started to calm down at bit.

"Remus…"

"No," he said. "I mean it. I'm not saying it because I think it's what you need or want to hear. I've been in love with you for a long time and I just wasn't willing to admit it to myself because I didn't think I deserved you. And I don't. But I love you so much, Claire, and if I can't have you and love you and protect you I think I'll burst. I understand if you don't feel anything for me, but I need you to know how much I wish you'd be mine. Well," he admitted sheepishly, "that and I sort of made a deal that I'd ask you out if Sirius helped me with talking to you. Clearly not much of it sank in."

"No," she whispered. "No, Remus, you've done beautifully." She gave a watery sort of laugh and sighed, "Obviously I'm not ready to say things like 'love', but I'm incredibly drawn to you. And the more I try to avoid you and pretend there's nothing there… well, the more I realize I need you."

She didn't say another word. She didn't need to, but she couldn't have even if she'd wanted to because Remus cut off further words with his mouth, pulling her into a sweet but lingering kiss. He didn't want to scare her because he knew she needed space and he knew Sirius would have stabbed him if he'd tried, but he poured as much of his love and passion into that sweet, chaste kiss as possible. They pulled apart and she rested her forehead on his, sighing heavily.

"Can I call you mine?" he sighed, not sure if he was moving too fast, but needing to know. "I don't want anyone else to think they have a right–"

"Shh," she muttered, pressing a finger against his lips. "You've got nothing to worry about, Remus. I'm yours."

At first, nobody noticed the difference between the pair except for Audrey and Sirius, but Claire didn't waste time moving from secret snogs and holding hands under the table at meals to kissing him lightly in public and holding his hand in the corridors. And Remus felt like king of the world.

Boys were jealous of him, which was a rare feeling, and Regulus Black was actually glaring viciously at Remus in the corridors. The Marauders were pleased and proud, of course. Remus and Claire had taken to curling up on the couch after his rounds at night and telling stories, and they often fell asleep there in the common room. He could find her from nearly anywhere in the castle just by following her scent, and he spent most of his day thinking about her. They still hadn't gotten past kissing, but Remus didn't mind. The fact that she was his was all he needed in that moment to make everything perfect between them.

"Have you noticed something?" Claire asked one night, nuzzling his neck sweetly.

"I've noticed a great many things," he said with a bit of a smirk. "What in particular?"

"Well, Audrey," Claire muttered against his skin, kissing it gently. "I think she might have a crush on someone…"

"Oh?" Remus muttered, moaning slightly as she nibbled his skin. "On who?"

"You haven't noticed?" she gasped, stopping her ministrations and looking him in the eye. He sighed.

"No, I have," he groaned, "just wanted to know if you noticed the same thing I noticed."

She glowered at him, but he wiped that off her face with a deep kiss, which she responded to immediately. Of course, they had both realized that Audrey had a crush on Sirius, but to be realistic, every girl but Claire and Lily seemed to have a crush on Sirius. Remus wasn't sure why this was suddenly big information. Perhaps Claire was of the impression that they ought to find some way of putting the pair together?

"Remus," she sighed against his mouth, rolling on top of him and burrowing her hands up his shirt. She moaned deeply into his mouth, the vibration making him dizzy with pleasure. How had he ever gotten so lucky?

He had an urge to role her over and hover over her as he explored her neck, and maybe a bit lower that time, but he couldn't bring himself to push her like that, not yet. Someday he wanted to move forward, but that day couldn't be too soon. Sirius would skin him alive, and the damage he could do to Claire… well, Remus wouldn't be able to live with himself.

For a while, they were happy like that, very few changes in their lives except their constant closeness. By the first of October, the coupling of Remus Lupin and Claire Black was such old news that nobody even buzzed about whether they were going to Hogsmeade together. It was expected.

In a way, this was a relief to Remus that people had stopped staring at him and whispering. Despite being a Marauder, he'd never attracted the attention Sirius and James had, and he was perfectly happy with that. Claire, on the other hand, was in solid competition with Lily for the most-talked-about female in school, not any less so because of whom her brother was, and her love life was fodder for all of the "best" gossip. She seemed to have hardly noticed when their relationship had been all anyone could talk about, and so noticed even less that people had stopped discussing them.

Hogsmeade would typically be a time for them to all be together, Claire and Audrey and the Marauders, keeping James from stalking Lily, teasing Sirius when he went off to meet and shag whatever girl he'd agreed to meet that week, and pumping themselves so full of sweets they all had stomachaches by nightfall. Keeping James from stalking Lily was still on the docket, however Sirius had no date (on Claire's request), and instead Remus and Claire would be spending time alone together after lunch. Remus's heart raced as they walked down to the village, terrified it wouldn't be good enough for her.

They spent much of the morning at Zonko's, which was one of Claire's and Sirius's favorite places in the world. Remus felt himself being dragged around the shop by his hand, sighing as she told him why some products were good, and why others weren't, and whether she would be able to duplicate or improve upon them. Sometimes he wondered where she learned all the spells she mentioned when she chattered on about her plans, but he supposed she did well in class, so she must study sometime.

After Zonko's, they all went to Honeydukes, gathering up chocolate like there was no tomorrow. This was one thing Remus and Claire had always been kindred spirits about. They were absolute chocolate fanatics. Together they got far more chocolate than any one person should eat in a year and she insisted on feeding him lovingly from a bar of Honeydukes Best that she'd gotten. Remus couldn't understand how he'd gotten so lucky, being tenderly fed chocolate by the most beautiful girl in the world, but he wasn't about to question it and lose her. She'd find out she deserved better soon enough and until then he wanted as much of her as he could get.

Then the group made their way to the Three Broomsticks for lunch, Claire taking a seat on Remus's lap as Sirius and James went to get drinks for the group.

"What are you going to do after lunch, Remus?" Peter asked as they waited. "Madam Pudifoot's?"

"No way in hell," Claire snarled. "I'm allergic to cherubs."

Remus snorted with laughter as Peter blushed and murmured his apologies about how he had forgotten that particular fabricated allergy.

Claire had a lot of fabricated allergies. From cherubs to Slytherins to Charms essays, her allergies were many and varied. The boys did their best to keep her away from her many fabricated allergies, because the reactions usually were violent and included screaming, clawing, and random curse-casting.

"I want to keep it a surprise," Remus said, kissing Claire swiftly before she could argue that she was allergic to surprises, too. He knew this, but he also knew that that allergy only counted when she wasn't happy with the surprise. He hoped, certainly, that she would be happy with the only he had planned.

Sirius and James started passing around the butterbeer, leaning back in their own chairs.

"Poor Audrey," James said teasingly, pulling playfully on a lock of his sister's hair. "Stuck with us boys when dear Claire is off on her date. Whatever are you going to do, you poor, sweet thing?"

Audrey pouted at him, looking even more pathetic, but Remus didn't miss how her hazel eyes darted toward Sirius longingly. Maybe… maybe Claire was right. Maybe they would be good together, but why would Sirius ever look at Audrey? He had all of the most beautiful girls in school (except Lily and Claire) practically throwing themselves at him on a daily basis.

And yet, Remus tried thinking back, Sirius always liked to tease Audrey, enjoyed stealing her things and pulling her hair. He got particularly angry at girls who pretended to befriend Audrey in an attempt to get closer to the Marauders, more so than with his sister, although Remus had always attributed that to Audrey not realizing that she was being used. Perhaps Claire was right. Perhaps there was something there that Sirius just didn't realize yet.

"She'll be just fine," Claire said. "You boys will take good care of her, and she'll enjoy herself immensely and if I hear otherwise, there will be hell to pay, yes, Padfoot?"

Sirius barked with laughter.

"Why are you pointing fingers at me, baby?"

"Because," she said sternly, "Peter is always considerate and James treats Audrey incredibly well. But you're impulsive and you like to tease her. Don't tease her today, is that understood?"

Sirius gave her a quizzical look as if he had no idea what she was talking about, teasing Audrey, but he nodded and said of course. The six of them ate their lunches and downed their butterbeer, happily and merrily talking about their favorite events of the morning, including the nose-biting teacup that had attacked Peter at Zonko's.

As soon as they finished eating, Remus could feel his hands shaking violently as the clutched for Claire's. They were going to be spending time together. Alone. On a date. It was his first date, and although he'd gotten a bit of advice from Sirius and Lily for planning it, he was terrified that it would be all wrong and Claire would hate it. Of course, she would be too nice to say so, but that was what made it even more terrifying.

"Come on," he said in her ear when he finally got his nerves under control. "Let's go."


	5. Letting Go

Claire gripped Remus's hand excitedly as they walked away from the village a ways, somewhere between the school gate and the houses that lined the village loosely. There was a grassy, meadow area where someone, probably Lily on Remus's request, had set up some blankets and a light picnic for a snack when the afternoon got later. Remus set down their shopping and lay down on a blanket, motioning for Claire to join him, which she did with a smile.

"I know it's not much," he said nervously, "but what do you think?"

"I think it's perfect," she said honestly, pressing her lips to his and curling up in his warm arms.

He smelled like chocolate and the Three Broomsticks, which were both pleasant smells, but there was also a hint of his scent that was that which was inherently Remus, and that was fast becoming her favorite smell in the whole world.

"Do you think they'll see it?" she whispered.

"What?" he asked.

"Audrey and Sirius," she sighed, nuzzling her neck in his. "Do you think they'll see how utterly perfect they are for each other and stop being so stupid?"

"I – I don't know," Remus muttered, clearly trying to concentrate on the conversation despite her tongue beginning to trace his neck.

"Mmm," she moaned, carefully pressing her lips to the hollow of his throat. "You smell delicious, Moony."

He was trembling, his hands cautiously twitching to her waist, carefully wrapping around her and pulling their bodies flush against each other as she trailed her mouth up his neck.

"Claire," he exhaled huskily, but whatever he might have said after that was cut off with her mouth descending hotly on his, passionately engaging him in a dominant kiss. Perhaps it wasn't the best, most private of places to be so forward, but all Claire could think about was how good it felt to be so close to him in the open air for once.

To her surprise, he began to struggle back, fighting for dominance, and not just with their battling tongues. It took several minutes for the exchange to become heated enough for him to lose himself in the passion, but when he did he rolled them over so that he hovered over her, his body pinning her to the ground and his hands shakily exploring her torso. She gasped into his mouth as he palmed and squeezed her breasts through the fabric of her shirt and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him even closer.

That wasn't enough, though, and her hands slipped under the fabric of his shirt, her fingernails scratching down his abdomen, then back up his shirt, pulling the material up and over his head. When they broke the kiss to remove the shirt, his mouth found her neck and she writhed at the feel of his warm, wet mouth on her skin.

She whined a bit, her fingers running through his hair as he worked his own hands under her shirt, palming her breasts through her thin lace bra.

"Remus," she moaned. She bit her lip as he groaned against her skin. She whimpered even more when he pulled his mouth off her neck, just a hair's breadth away from touching her.

"Claire," he whined. "Claire, you have no idea... no idea how much... how... I just... Claire, I need you."

She could feel her face pooling with crimson but she couldn't be sure if it was from embarrassment of realizing how aroused he was or from her own arousal.

She needed him too.

Claire continued to bite her lip as she did some fast thinking. They were out in the open, there was too much likelihood that someone would come along, and she couldn't deny that she wanted it to continue.

"Take me to the Shrieking Shack, Remus," she whispered. "Please?"

"Are you sure?" he asked, brows furrowing with worry.

"Please," she moaned.

Before she realized what was happening he was taking her to the shack as fast as he could. The pathway was so familiar to him that it didn't take them long, and once inside he found the bed, he sat down beside her, staring into her eyes with longing.

She hadn't thought she would be so ready so soon, but she'd never felt anything like the aching need she was feeling then for Remus. Being unclothed around him wasn't anything new, so she began to peel off her clothes, watching the reverent look in Remus's eyes as he marveled at each new bit of skin she revealed to him.

He asked her about every scar as he started peeling off his own clothes, eyes still fixed on her skin. She answered, feeling like each story was a weight off her chest, each tale of her years of being beaten and told how worthless she was.

In return, she was pleased to find, Remus let her ask about each of his scars. There were many more, and she already had a rough idea of what they were all from, but she asked anyway, and he answered, obviously trying not to think too much on it.

Her fingertips brushed a scar on his shoulder that was deeper, thicker, than the others. It was the palest, too, practically white and she asked him what it was.

"That's my first scar," he whispered, frowning, not wanting to look at it. "That's what made me what I am."

She leaned forward and pressed her lips to the scar, attacking it with gentle kisses and clutching at the musty sheets when he gave a soft moan. She felt a tear roll down her cheek and splash onto his skin and Remus took her by the upper arms with his strong hands and pulled her back so that they were look each other in the eye.

"Claire," Remus whispered, "What's the matter?"

"It's not fair," she sighed, shaking her head as the tears began coming faster than she could blink them away. "You did nothing wrong. You were just an innocent child and they took your chance at a normal life away from you before you had the chance to make your own mistakes."

"What about you?" he asked, incredulous. "I mean, you didn't do anything wrong either! You can't control where you're Sorted! You certainly can't control Sirius! And what your father did to you... Claire, there's no justification for what they've taken away from you. Your chance at a normal life was ripped from you, if a little bit less definitely than it was from me."

Eventually, he knew, she could mend, if not completely than quite a bit.

"It's not the same," she whispered. "It's not at all the same."

Before he could argue with her, though, her lips pressed against his and he forgot what he was even arguing. They managed to strip down bare without breaking the kiss, ignoring the remainder of their scars as they crossed the familiar territory of pressing their naked bodies together and relishing each other's kiss.

"Claire," he whispered against her collarbone, well aware that he was quivering with need, "I need to warn you about a couple of things."

"Mmm," she moaned, running her fingers through his hair.

He took that as her trying to say she understood that he needed to say something rather than her attempting to coax his tongue back onto her skin.

"I need to know," he said softly, "that you really want this. I need to stop now or I might not be able to stop, I want you so badly. I need to know that's okay, because I don't want to hurt you."

"You could never hurt me," she said sweetly, smiling sadly down at him. "You love me. You care about me. You could never hurt me. I'm sure."

"But are you sure about this?" he said urgently. "This, here and now?"

Claire smiled, pressing her lips to his and then whispering against them, "I've never been more sure of anything.

Remus shivered, clutching her shoulders tightly, pressing his lips to hers intently. That didn't last too long, though, before he began kissing her body eagerly, worshipping every bit of her skin that he could, silently thanking every deity he could think of that he had this angel in his arms. All of his dreams, coming true right before his very eyes. Maybe he couldn't stop being a werewolf, but if he could still manage to have Claire, maybe it wasn't so bad.

She sighed contentedly as he made his way down her body. He made short work of ensuring that they were absolutely naked together in that bed, although the sight of the scars on her legs made him feel queasy with anger. He pressed his lips to the one on the right leg and she jumped a bit. Then he pressed his lips to the one on the left.

Remus tried to remember everything Sirius had told him about sexual relations and physical encounters. Sensitive spots... breasts, neck, and everything 'surrounding the end goal'. He found they were all the places he felt an urge to touch and explore anyway, even without the help from Sirius.

He started with her neck, kissing it gently as he'd done so many times. She sighed, running her fingers through his hair as he spent his energy and attention worshipping the perfect curve and texture of her neck. When he was satisfied that her neck had been properly attended to and his curiosity was starting to drive him, he moved down to her breasts, admiring their perfect shape and swell. There was a scar on the top of her right breast, one that might have looked to the untrained eye like someone used her to put out their cigarette, but Remus knew it was a burn from her father's wand, prodding her like cattle, branding her like livestock. It made him sick to look at, so he closed his eyes and moved his fingertips to her right breast, running them along the skin, relishing at the way she trembled when he touched her. Eyes still closed, he moved his mouth to her left breast, still exploring and massaging the right with his fingertips, and he began kissing, licking, sucking, and exploring the left thoroughly with his mouth.

"Remus," she moaned, her voice shaky and breathless. Remus could feel himself hardening at the sound and he himself moaned into her skin. It just felt so good. All of it, everything just felt so good. Sirius had told him it would feel amazing, but Remus had never suspected just how wonderful...

He continued his path downward, across her bare stomach, noticing how her muscles contracted at the contact of his lips on her skin. His nose was picking up the scent of her arousal and his mouth began to water. If Sirius hadn't told him that was a natural male reaction, he might have been concerned it had something to do with the wolf.

Not that he would have stopped himself, even then. Remus couldn't stop. He had to feel her, to taste her, to know what it was like to be inside her body and become one with his princess. When he arrived at his 'end goal', Remus was overcome with the need to taste her, and when he positioned his mouth and tasted some of her ready juices, both his mouth and his ears were not disappointed. She gasped and moaned and the sound was almost as delicious as her taste as he lapped her up eagerly. The way she writhed on his tongue, the sounds she made... Remus was on sensory overload and he was getting harder by the second.

He realized she was about to climax when she practically screamed his name. He readied himself for the rush of juices Sirius had warned him about and while he didn't lap up all of them, wanting to make sure that she was still wet enough, he did savor a bit of it. She just tasted so good.

At that point, though, instinct and his own arousal took over. He positioned himself to enter her, his lips eagerly kissing her neck as he prepared himself. He must have taken longer than he thought, though, because Claire moaned, "Remus, _please_!"

At her insistence, he thrust into her, gasping at how incredibly good it felt, the tight, wet, warmth of her surrounding him. Her muscles contracted slightly and he moaned. It took him a moment to get used to the overwhelmingly delicious sensation and begin to move. He tried to remember Sirius's words... _Just thrust in and out, Moony. Technique comes with experience._

And so he thrust.

The sounds she made and the way she moved with his thrusting to increase the friction told him that he was doing something right. Claire dug her fingernails into his shoulders, gasped and clawed and moaned his name and it only made everything Remus was feeling feel that much better. Even the sensation of her drawing blood with her fingernails felt somehow incredibly arousing. He would have to ask Sirius if that was something to do with the wolf or not. He was so worried about unleashing and relishing anything that had to do with the wolf, no matter how good it felt.

Remus gasped, realizing that he was close to not being able to hold on much longer, especially with her helping it along.

"Claire," he hissed, "I'm... I... I can't..."

"Me too," she moaned loudly. "It's okay, just... Ah, Remus!" she cried, her muscles contracting around him, sending him over the edge as he exploded inside her, roaring her name with the incredible power of the sensation, the sensation he was instinctively, internally associating with her.

When he came to his senses again, he was still inside her, still on top of her, and they were both panting frantically.

"That was incredible," she sighed, using what little strength she seemed to have left to turn them over so that they were both on their sides, facing each other and holding each other loosely but close. "Truly, I never thought I'd feel something like that."

"I didn't hurt you?" he asked urgently. "Because I didn't want to hurt you."

"Trust me," Claire said with a laugh, "you far from hurt me. I, on the other hand, did hurt you."

"What are you talking about?" he asked, confused.

She gestured to his shoulders and he remembered her breaking the skin in their moment of passion. He laughed softly.

"Trust me," he sighed, "it might hurt later, but it felt good in the moment. No, wand down, Claire. You're terrible at healing charms. Besides, I think those are some scars I'd be proud to wear."

She giggled a bit as he pressed his lips to her neck lightly, still feeling like he was walking in a dream. He didn't deserve any of this, and yet there he was, lying in a bed, skin on skin with the most beautiful girl in the world.

"I suppose we should go back to the school soon," he whispered, tracing shapes on her skin with his fingertips.

Claire frowned.

"I don't want to go," she sighed. "This has been the best day ever."

Remus smiled.

"I agree," he muttered against her skin as he kissed her neck tenderly. "We will definitely have to find plenty of ways to do this again. But your brother will probably go looking for us if we don't get back soon. I'd rather not have to explain that we were late getting back because we wanted to lay skin on skin a bit longer."

"You never know, he could be thrilled," Claire teased. "He's been telling me for ages that being frightened of everything that touches me is no way to move on. I don't think he expected quite this, though," she admitted, running her fingers lazily through her raven locks. Remus sighed, feeling a bit of a pervert to watch the way it made her breasts look when she did that, but after what they'd just done, maybe he had a bit of a right.

"No, I don't think he did," Remus admitted with a laugh. "C'mon, though, we might miss dinner and I'd hate it if you were hungry because I was being selfish."

She sighed and nodded, finally getting up and finding her clothes, pulling them on as she went. Remus regretted that sight, Claire covering her beautiful body, but he reminded himself that nobody else was allowed to see it but him. She was covering herself because he was the only person who got the pleasure of that wonderful view.

Once that thought hit him, Remus found he couldn't wipe the smile off his face.

Claire looked up and saw him smiling at her and she flushed, confused.

"What?" she said.

"Nothing," Remus sighed. "Just thinking about how beautiful you are."

She flushed even deeper and Remus congratulated himself. He'd made the queen of the universe flush, and that had to be a good sign.

Okay, so maybe she wasn't quite the queen of the universe, but she was the queen of his universe, and that was really all that mattered. As he quickly pulled on his own clothes and laced his fingers in hers, they headed back up to the castle, trying not to walk too fast. Why waste perfectly good time alone together?

When they joined their friends, most of them just teased the pair, probably guessing and hoping as much as anything. James seemed happily oblivious, but Remus didn't miss the knowing look that passed between Audrey and Sirius across the table. Perhaps Claire was right. Perhaps they ought to try putting those two together. They certainly kept up with each other quite nicely.

Claire's fingers rested gently on Remus's knee as she drank her pumpkin juice, and Remus couldn't help but grin as he moved his hand to cover hers, locking their fingers together under the table and ignoring the taunts of their friends.

Some things were better left unsaid.


	6. Making a Pact

**A/N: This chapter is dedicated to **_**tearsandsmiles**_**, whose interest in this story sparked the beginning of this chapter!**

** -J**

Days went by and years went by, and when they were in their seventh year of Hogwarts, Claire and Remus were no longer anything close to news. In fact, much to James's dismay, they were Hogwarts's cutest couple. Remus still treated Claire like the princess he seemed to think she was, and Claire went to Remus as her shelter and comfort from nearly everything.

Seventh year, Claire decided, would be her last chance for some things. The wizarding world was small, but not so small that she could guarantee things if she didn't get the balls rolling while still at school. Sure, Sirius and James were likely to still practically be attached at the hip, but that didn't mean that Audrey wouldn't find some way to accidentally fall off the map. She accidentally fell quite a lot, after all, although not usually in the metaphorical sense.

Claire sat down with Remus by the fireplace in the Gryffindor common room, running her fingers playfully through his hair as he tried to read his Arithmancy notes.

"You had better have a very, very good reason for distracting me like that," Remus muttered, half-joking. He was very nearly the touchiest part of his cycle, which made him a lot more irritable, a lot rasher, and a lot hornier.

Not that those things every really bothered Claire, but she'd always respected that that was the way things were and she'd never before tried to take advantage of them for her own purposes, even though she just naturally tended to take advantage of people and situations. She'd never wanted to do that with Remus, especially with his condition, especially after Sirius almost killed Severus Snape using Remus's condition. But in that moment, she figured that as she wasn't trying to kill or even hurt anyone in anyway, he would forgive her when all was said and done.

"Maybe I do," she sighed into his ear. "Why don't you come upstairs with me and find out."

It was their free period, and everyone else had gone down to the lake, so as long as Remus warded the door against intruders they wouldn't be interrupted.

Of course, Claire wasn't simply teasing him to get her way. She wanted him, too. She didn't ever not want him, which sometimes led to embarrassing moments in class when she would moan out loud as he ran his fingertip thoughtfully along his lip as he wrote or read. It didn't hurt that she wanted his help with something.

After all, she knew she did owe him, so he really didn't have to do anything for her. He'd saved her life. He made her get help when he and Sirius and Audrey found out that she wasn't eating. He made her eat even when all she'd wanted to do was run the other direction from the Great Hall and never see food again. The Healers at St. Mungo's said she could have been dead in about a week.

Claire had sworn to Remus that she wasn't going to do it again, although it had been a hard promise to keep. He seemed more and more pleased every time he saw her naked body, though, always commenting on how much healthier she looked. This time, pulling off her clothes slowly to tease him as well as to think about what she wanted to say, Claire watched his eyes light up with a hunger so powerful she had only seen it when they were first together, and her own desire grew tenfold with that realization.

Audrey could wait, Claire decided, pushing him so that he sat on his bed, looking up at her with eager eyes as she straddled his lap, running her fingers lazily through his hair as she came down to meet her lips with his, enjoying the almost instant feel of his own fingers exploring her skin. They stayed like that for some time, him alternating between caressing and clutching her body tightly against him, her reveling in the taste of him and the feel of his strong, capable hands. The things those hands could do, she knew...

Remus rolled her over onto the bed, kissing his way down her naked body as he eagerly began removing his own clothes, giving Claire the moment to just writhe happily at the sensation of his touch, to sigh deeply knowing how much she loved the feel of his lips on her skin.

"You taste so good," he moaned, finally pulling off his boxers and tossing them haphazardly to the side, never turning his full attention from her body. "How are you so perfect, love?"

She just sighed, knowing she wasn't perfect but not wanting the argument that would result from disagreeing on the matter. Besides, coming up with words when he was being so good to her body was so difficult.

"Remus," she finally moaned, "more."

He kissed her again as he put a finger inside of her, working it in and out as his tongue worked in and out of her mouth, just enough to taste him, to taste a bit of herself on his tongue, and to shiver at the eroticism of it.

How had she gotten so incredibly lucky?

Another finger was added and she gasped with pleasure as the pace increased. He knew just how to make her melt.

It was a matter of moments before the fingers were completely removed and she moaned in protest, opening her mouth to beg him to put them back, but she was surprised to find them instead being put in her waiting mouth, and the dark lust in his eyes when she opened hers prompted her to begin licking her juices off of them as he groaned, positioning himself to enter her.

"Merlin, Claire," he gasped as they finally came together, her third orgasm in that one encounter, she realized as she curled up against his sweaty body, practically collapsing with exhaustion. "You're just too much."

"Don't say that," Claire teased breathlessly. "It'll make me think you don't want me anymore."

"Never," Remus assured her urgently, kissing her deeply once more, holding her tightly against him as though afraid she would disappear, and Claire felt a twinge of guilt at her silly joke. She shouldn't have pushed Remus's insecurities for her amusement, and she knew it, but sometimes it was hard not to. He was always so afraid of losing her that sometimes she provoked his fear without even meaning to.

"I love you," she said gently, kissing his lips tenderly but shortly. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm sorry I teased."

Remus shook his head slightly, probably thinking she would notice, as he kissed her jaw, then her neck, then down to her chest, above her breasts but below her collarbone, one of his favorite places to kiss her.

"I love you too," he finally whispered, his hold on her loosening. "But I know you want something. I can smell it. You're determined, maybe even a bit anxious. Not in a bad way. What do you want, baby?"

She smiled, knowing he hadn't said that intentionally. Sometimes he would call her baby, like Sirius did, without even realizing it, and it was always when he was most content, happiest. Whenever he said it she couldn't help but smile.

"You know me so well," Claire sighed, running her fingers lazily through his sandy brown hair. "It's about Sirius and Audrey. They've had more than enough time to figure out that they're meant to be together. I think it's about time we force their eyes open, for their own good, of course."

Remus chuckled, nuzzling against her breasts, a smile on his face.

"You're right, something does need to be done," he whispered. "You didn't need to give me that admittedly wonderful sexual experience for me to agree on that. I suppose you have some ideas, though?"

Claire laughed, loving how perfectly Remus understood her, loving how he didn't get mad at her for what she'd done. If she had expected him to be upset about it, she probably would have done it.

"You're the Marauder," she teased. "Isn't that supposed to be your area of expertise, love?"

"On the contrary, my darling," he said with a raspy sort of laugh. "That's Sirius's area of expertise, and obviously we can't ask him!"

"You're right, that would put a bit of a damper on things, wouldn't it?" Claire sighed. "I don't suppose we could get James to help?"

Remus frowned thoughtfully and sat up slightly.

"No," he said slowly. "Although I can think of someone who might."

She looked up at his face expectantly.

"Lily," he said with a shrug. "I think Lily would be thrilled to help young love."

Claire snorted and said, "I don't think Lily Evans would think much of the pair. She'll think Sirius doesn't deserve Audrey."

"Well," Remus said reasonably, with a shrug, "he doesn't."

Claire wanted to argue on her twin's behalf, but she knew that Remus was right. Sirius really didn't deserve a girl as sweet and innocent and wonderful as Audrey, but it didn't keep Audrey from wanting him, and it certainly didn't keep them from being perfect for each other.

"If you can get Evans on our side," Claire bargained, "since she likes you better than me, I think we can try to work with her, then."

Remus smirked at her pushing the difficult part onto him.

When they'd first arrived at school, Claire and Lily had clashed horribly with each other. Lily hadn't been as self-obsessed as Claire, but she'd been the ones to stand up and tell Claire the truth, even when it was the last thing Claire wanted to hear. In fact, that was usually the case. Needless to say, the catfights had been spectacular those first couple of years.

Even as Claire's spirit was being broken down at home, she kept on her brave face where Lily Evans was concerned because it would have been like Sirius apologizing to Snivellus if she had done anything but fight with Lily. It wasn't necessarily that anything escalated, because Claire didn't have the heart for that, but it certainly didn't get any less nasty.

"I'll talk with her," Remus assured Claire, kissing her hand gently, brushing his lips against her knuckles as he'd done a thousand times before.

Claire sighed, deciding that they couldn't do any more about the Audrey-Sirius Mission (as she was calling it in her brain) until they'd gathered everyone who had any sort of interest in putting the pair together. She would brainstorm on her own, and maybe talk to James.

Then she realized something that could be wonderful, given the right circumstances.

"Remus I just had a wonderful thought," she said excitedly. "You work on Lily, I'll work on James, and maybe we can make two matches instead of just the one!"

Remus blanched.

"Claire, I'm not sure that's such a great idea..."

"Remus, darling," she sighed, wrapping her leg around his hip and watching his eyes glaze with lust. "What better way to get Evans off her high horse than to give them a common goal, make them work together? Once they realize they do work well together, we'll have the perfect little pair."

"I think you've been listening to too much of James's rhetoric," Remus gasped hoarsely, pulling her body closer to his. "They're not perfect for each other."

"Don't argue with me, love," she warned him, putting her finger over his lips to silence the words she didn't agree with. He complied like a puppy who'd learned well not to disobey his master. "You'll work on securing Lily Evans for our task, yes?"

"Um, sure," Remus said slowly, obviously more dubious about this revised plan, but Claire didn't really care.

"Then I'll work on James," Claire said happily. "Leave the peacemaking to me."

Remus frowned, obviously thinking that Claire making peace between Lily and James was like telling Dumbledore to make peace between Voldemort and the Minister. But he just nodded compliantly.

Claire spent the next day trying to get James on his own, which, unsurprisingly, was easier said than done.

Sirius was with him all morning, and then there were classes, and he and Audrey shared a free period. Peter followed him around most of the afternoon. At dinner, though, Claire was struck with a plan.

"James," she said sweetly as possible, "I need your help with something."

Sirius and James jerked to look at her with surprise and Remus rolled his eyes, looking down at his cake.

"What?" James asked, looking puzzled.

"Can't tell you in such a public place," Claire said sweetly. "But I really need your help, and it's got to be you, James."

"What about me?" Sirius said sharply.

"And what if my having your help would spoil a surprise?" Claire said, batting her eyes teasingly at her twin, who frowned.

"It's not our birthday."

"No."

"I already know what you got me for Christmas."

"Damn you, Sirius, can't you just let me surprise you for once?" Claire sighed. "I really want to do it just this once!"

He chuckled, although she knew he was annoyed that he couldn't guess what it was even for, much less what the surprise was.

James followed her to a classroom and she made sure the door was sealed properly before she turned to him.

"You just made it so Sirius can't listen in?" he said, smirking.

"Yes," she sniffed. "Because you know as well as I do that he's right outside that door right now trying to hear everything we're saying."

"Is it really a surprise for him?"

"In a manner of speaking," she said with a sly smile, motioning for him to sit. James did so, quirking his eyebrow at her questioningly. "I'm sure you've noticed by now that your sweet sister is completely infatuated with Sirius."

He blinked.

"Is she really?" he said incredulously. "How long has that been going on?"

Claire's jaw dropped.

She'd known the boys could all be a bit thick at times, but could James really have missed that?

"Pretty much as long as I've known her," Claire snorted. "Everybody's seen it but you and Sirius, apparently. Remus and I have decided they're perfect for each other and we're going to set them up."

James blinked again.

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" he asked slowly, hesitantly. "I mean, Audrey's really sweet and sort of quiet and... well, Sirius is my best mate and all, but he's not got the world's best track record with women."

"It's an opportunity to get you with Lily," Claire said coaxingly. "She's agreed to help. And it would show her how mature you've become-"

"You think I've become mature?" James said, in an excited way that made him seem about twelve, puffing out his chest and running his fingers through his hair.

Claire snorted.

"Down boy, I'm taken," she teased. "Anyway, I think if you don't ever do that again, then yes, you've matured a lot. But the point is if Sirius understands how much Audrey likes him, he'll treat her right. If not for her sake, than for our sakes. That's my best friend and your sister we're talking about, here. How could he not treat her right?"

James frowned slightly. She could tell he liked the idea of working with Lily, and getting Audrey what she wanted, because he loved to spoil her when he got the chance, but he was still struggling with the idea of his baby sister dating Hogwarts's bad boy.

"If I agree to do this," James said slowly, "I need to have rights."

Claire didn't like the sound of that. Conditions beyond having access to Lily other than being Head Boy was like giving him a present and then giving him the money for the present he was buying her in return.

She didn't like it at all.

"What do you mean by rights?" she asked cautiously. "What sort of rights?"

He looked like he was pondering the question, although she knew he knew perfectly well what he wanted.

"I need the right to look out for my sister's needs," James said. "I need the right to wash my hands of this if things go badly. I need the right to use this as a selling point with Lily."

Claire very nearly grinned, but stopped herself. He was finally calling her 'Lily' instead of 'Evans'. That was a massive selling point right there, forget organizing his sister's love life. But saying such would not work in Claire's favor, so she merely nodded.

"I believe we can arrange something that benefits everybody," she agreed. "And don't you dare even give my brother so much as a hint, Prongs, or I'm having your head."

"Agreed," James said happily, and she smirked as he left, taking off almost immediately to find her boyfriend.

Remus was making his way down to the Great Hall when she caught him on the marble steps and kissed him deeply. He moaned into her mouth, ignoring the giggling first years that passed them as he pulled her closer.

"I take it you got James on board," he sighed as he pulled away from the kiss, pressing his forehead to hers.

"Whatever made you guess, dear?" she teased, kissing his nose happily.

"The kiss was a pretty good start," Remus laughed. "Well, Lily's agreed to help, so we may be making two matches. Wouldn't that be something?"

Claire snorted.

"A Black and a werewolf, love. We're unstoppable."

Remus blanched when she said 'werewolf', looking around to make sure no one had heard her before breathing a sigh of relief.

"I love you," he said carefully, "but don't do that again."

"Yes, dear," she said, frowning slightly at his fear. "You know nothing's going to happen."

But of course, that was a promise that Claire wouldn't be able to keep.


	7. The Pride of Sirius Black

"I now call this meeting into order!" Claire said in a loud whisper, pleased with herself. Remus fought the urge to roll his eyes at his girlfriend.

"We're not actually an organization, Black," Lily sighed. "I wish you would have warned me they were doing this too, Remus."

Remus just shrugged, a bit annoyed that Lily couldn't be a little more open-minded and friendly, especially where Claire was concerned. After all, she knew all the pain Claire had been to, and that Claire had never personally done anything to Lily.

But girls were stupid about some things, and even Lily had her weak points.

"Now, Lily," James said with his best smile, "if we want this to work, we all have to work together. If Claire wants it to be official, what will it hurt?"

"Only my sanity," Lily grumbled, but Remus had to admit that James had handled the situation much better than expected.

"So to be clear, our goal," Claire continued as though no one had spoken against her leadership style, which made Remus grin, "is to get Sirius and Audrey to stop being silly and realize they were made for each other and putting them together and such and so on."

"Right," James said with a nod. "Sirius is already not seeing someone because he knows how you don't approve of him dating around."

When James said this, Lily looked over at Claire like she'd never quite seen her before. Remus smiled a little to himself, recognizing that Lily had never really looked at Claire as anything but an extension of her brother, or as the self-centered pureblood princess she'd been in her first couple of years at Hogwarts. And that was Lily's greatest flaw. She would decide who people were, usually being right, and then not allowing herself to see how they had changed, like James and Claire and Snape.

Granted, Sirius hadn't really changed much, but she'd never really gotten to know him in the first place. She didn't know all the good in him.

"Excellent," Claire said happily. "And Audrey's never really dated. She's been spending years mooning over Sirius. So getting her to notice him wouldn't be a problem."

"No, it'll be getting him to see her as someone other than James's little sister," Remus agreed. "Speaking from experience, jealousy is a great motivator."

The wolf in Remus hadn't been able to stand the idea of someone else being with Claire, and he knew that the dog in Sirius would be the same if he realized he wanted Audrey.

Claire frowned.

"The first step to jealousy would be to get Sirius to notice Audrey," she said thoughtfully. "I think the three of us should be able to handle that."

"It would be awkward," James admitted. "But yeah, we got Remus to decide pursuing you was a good idea, didn't we?"

Remus could feel himself blush as Claire smirked triumphantly. Must they bring that up? But then, she was all his, so what did it really hurt?

"All right, the next step will be getting someone to flirt with Audrey," Claire said softly, thoughtfully. "It has to be someone Sirius would actually feel even remotely threatened by, someone he would want to keep Audrey away from, and someone we could contain."

"It has to be someone Audrey would even have a chance of being interested in," Lily agreed. "What about Sturgis?"

Sturgis Podmore was the captain of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team, not bad looking, a good friend of Audrey's and Lily's, and would be totally willing to help them out with just about anything.

"I like it," Remus said softly. "So Lily works on Sturgis, make sure he's ready to go when we need him, but not until we give him the signal to flirt, and we'll work on Sirius."

"All agreed?" Claire said eagerly.

The other three groaned at her silliness, but Remus couldn't help but smile a little bit. As if James had any right to be groaning at Claire when he and Sirius were about twice as bad about Marauder issues.

Lily had an Ancient Runes translation to work on, so she left Claire, Remus, and James sitting alone in the library.

"So when do we start?" Claire said softly.

"I think you should drop hints at dinner," Remus said thoughtfully, "then leave us to plant more seeds tonight. Think you could sleep in the girls' dormitories tonight?"

"Sure, I'll do a sleep-over with Audrey," Claire said with a shrug.

James and Remus exchanged a nervous glance, but Claire didn't see. Remus didn't think she would intentionally screw everything up, but he was a bit worried that she might let something slip, or that Audrey would figure it out just from Claire's behavior. But then again, it wasn't Audrey they really had to worry about. It was Sirius.

"So jealousy," James sighed. "Shouldn't be too hard. The problem is, Audrey's not really his type. You know, physically, I mean."

Audrey was a sweet girl, and nice enough looking, but she was a bit plain, especially compared with the girls Sirius usually dated. Claire, however, snorted.

"Just because you are all blind," she sighed. "Audrey's filled out quite a lot. Her face might be plain, but her figure is quite womanly, and that's really what Sirius cares about."

James choked.

"Excuse me?" he hissed. "Did you just say that my baby sister has a _womanly figure_?"

"Well, she does," Claire said with a shrug. "Brothers don't tend to notice these things. You should have seen Sirius's face when our mother first declared that she would have to take me bra shopping. He was so confused and horrified. But I assure you, Audrey's at least a B-cup, and probably closer to a C and-"

"Stop," James whined. "Just stop, stop, stop! I refused to think about my sister's chest and you can't make me!"

Claire just giggled as James grabbed his book bag and hurried out of the library as fast as his feet could carry him.

Remus and Claire went down to dinner, though, and James and Sirius were already piling potatoes on their plates when the couple sat down with them. Remus was almost laughing when he saw Claire fake hiding her smug smile as she watched her brother. It was almost like he could see how she'd been raised to be Slytherin when she was pulling her brother around to what she wanted him to do, and Remus found it strangely attractive.

"What?" Sirius asked, looking at her smile with wide, gray eyes. "Do I have potatoes on my face?"

"No, no, it's nothing," Claire said, grinning down at her plate.

Sirius frowned, looking over at James, who shrugged, putting two steaks on his plate. If Remus and James could be nonchalant and unknowing while Claire worked her magic, they could pressure him when they were all alone. It would be more effective if they were able to hold their tongues while Claire was playing her games.

"If it's making you smile so pretty it's not nothing," Sirius pressed. "Unless it has to do with you in Remus's bed, and then I don't need to hear about it."

Claire laughed her most beautiful, full laugh. Her eyes sparkled perfectly as she looked down at her plate and Remus could tell from the look on Sirius's face that he wasn't at all pleased with the way she was acting, that it was driving him up the wall.

"C'mon, baby, just tell me what's going on," Sirius insisted. He was whining, which would be completely unattractive where most guys were concerned, but somehow Sirius managed to be incredibly attractive, even in whining like a child. It made Remus both jealous and annoyed all at once.

Claire shook her head with a cheeky smile.

"Wait, does this have something to do with my surprise?" Sirius said with a grin, sitting forward a bit. "It does, doesn't it?"

"Oh, Sirius," Claire sighed. "I don't want to lie to you."

Remus instantly was struck by how clever that statement was, because it wasn't a lie, it didn't really answer his question and it did make him think it did. Sirius's curiosity was insatiably whetted, and he wasn't going to let his twin leave that table until he'd gotten something he could work with out of her.

"C'mon, then, baby," Sirius said, flashing her his sweetest smile. "You don't have to lie. Just tell me."

She sighed and pouted, looking at him like she was trying to decide whether or not to say something, just as she did when she was actually trying to make a decision. That was a bit eerie for Remus because he knew how easily she would be able to fool just about anyone if it suited her, possibly including himself. So far he didn't know of any time when she actually pulled something over on him, but she'd never really tried. Even when she was starving herself she subconsciously wanted to get caught.

"Well," she sighed, "there's this girl."

"Yeah?" he asked, raising his eyebrows skeptically. Great, he was already thinking that she was talking about herself.

"Not me, you dolt," she snapped. She then turned sugary in half an instant. "Anyway, there's this girl who I've learned has had a crush on you for _years_. And she's wonderful and you would be so perfect for each other."

She'd learned. Remus nearly laughed at her perfect word choice. That way it didn't look like she'd known for years and was just now coming forward with the golden information. Claire was an absolute pro.

"Really?" he asked, confused. "I mean, someone you actually approve of? I thought you didn't want me dating, baby. Wait, who is it?"

"You know I can't tell you that, silly," she sighed, putting a bit of pudding on her plate. "Anyway, I don't have a problem with you dating, so long as you're actually dating and not just spending the night with a girl a few nights before getting bored with her and moving on to the next one."

Sirius shrugged as though there was nothing wrong with such behavior, even though he knew how it bothered his sister.

"Fair enough, I guess," he sighed. "But why can't you tell, baby? Surely there's no reason why you can't give me a hint or something."

Remus and James shared a muted look. Remus could sense that James, too, was enjoying watching Claire talk her brother into the things she wanted him to consider, and exactly how she wanted to consider them. It was like watching an artist paint their favorite subject.

"Sirius, you know I can't do that," she sighed, clicking her tongue at him. "It would be like you telling others about Marauder secrets. It's not for me to tell, and I can't betray a trust."

He looked at her like he didn't know what to make of his twin, staring at her, trying to figure out if she was messing with him or not. Remus watched as his friend's mouth flapped open and closed several times, just staring at her as she ate. He then turned to look at Remus and James again who just shrugged, and then he turned back to Claire.

"Wow," he sighed. "You know, I've been told you can be a bitch, but you've never done it to me before. I'm hurt."

Claire stiffened and Remus realized that this was the moment of truth. Her desire for this relationship or her pride.

It was a difficult decision for her, he knew, but she sat there, tense, for a long string of moments as Sirius continued to watch her expectantly, as if hoping she would decide that her pride was the most essential thing to her.

But Remus nearly let out a sigh of relief when she stood stiffly, turned to her brother and said, "Don't you ever speak to me like that again, Sirius. I won't be treated that way, even by you. You ought to know better."

Then she stormed off.

For a split second Remus wanted to go after her, to see if she was okay, but Lily must have been watching because she then grabbed Audrey by the wrist and they went after her.

So far everything was falling into place.

"What is her problem?" Sirius growled. "You know what, I've lost my appetite. Who wants to just go to bed?"

James and Remus shrugged once more.

"I'm in," Remus said.

"Yeah, I wasn't very hungry to start with," James lied, and the three went up the familiar path to their dormitory from the Great Hall.

Once they arrived, Sirius began pacing furiously, rambling about Claire.

"She's right, you know," Remus said to start out with. "You shouldn't speak to her like that."

Sirius froze, hands shaking.

"I know," he said softly. "I just... she just... I got so frustrated. I'll apologize tomorrow, I just... She's never done this to me before, not like this. I just snapped. You know? Sometimes... sometimes she makes people do stupid things. She's got this kind of power over people."

Remus knew exactly what he meant, but he merely nodded.

"So somebody's got a crush on me," Sirius sighed. "Someone who would confide this to Claire..."

They sat there for a moment, letting the tension and frustration fester a bit before James said softly, "You know... I think I might know who it is."

Sirius whipped around, shocked.

"Who?" he demanded.

James looked over at Remus.

"Are you thinking who I'm thinking?"

Remus tilted his head slightly, frowning a little bit.

"I think so," he said with a nod.

"Who?" Sirius whined.

James grinned a little.

"It'd be a great match," he said happily. "You get along great, and we'd all be really close like we already are. She's a sweet girl, too."

"That she is," Remus agreed with a nod and a small smile. "A very sweet girl."

"Who are you talking about?" Sirius demanded. "Tell me right now or so help me, I'll-"

"Audrey," James said softly. "It's Audrey."

Sirius blinked at first as though he wasn't sure if he'd heard properly, or understood, or something. Remus had to smile thinking that this must have been what he'd looked like when he first found out that Sirius approved of him dating Claire of all things. It all seemed like such madness, and he could see the wheels turning in Sirius's head.

"Audrey," he said flatly, still turning over the idea. "Your sister. Audrey Potter?"

"Yeah," Remus said with a nod. "That's the one."

He blinked again.

"You honestly think she likes me?" he said softly. He seemed to be coming around to the idea a bit more.

"I know it," James said confidently.

"This isn't like how you know that Evans is one day going to fall at your feet and think you're Adonis?" Sirius asked wryly.

"No, I think he's got this one right, actually," Remus said with a smile. "Audrey's always sort of... been drawn to you. I always thought it was obvious and that you weren't interested but-"

"This is insane," Sirius said softly, running his fingers through his hair anxiously. "Of course it wasn't obvious, I had no idea!" Remus and James exchanged amused looks. It had been obvious to everyone but Sirius, apparently. "She's... It's not that... I mean, she's your sister, for Merlin's sake, James!"

"And I'm dating your sister," Remus said with a shrug. "What's your point?"

"But she's so young!" Sirius cried.

"She's only a year below us," James said with a snort. "That's older than a lot of girls you've shagged."

"But she's so pure and innocent!" Sirius moaned. "I mean, have you looked at her? She's so... so..."

"Do you think she's pretty?" Remus cut in.

That would be the real test, because very few people would have called Audrey pretty. Cute, maybe. Nice enough. Even moderately attractive. She had a lovely smile. But pretty? No.

"She's beautiful, but-"

"What else is there to say?" James said with a shrug. "Let's face it, Sirius, you'll never find a nicer, sweeter, kinder girl to love you, and you've got my permission already. She's friends with all of us. Don't you think you ought to give her a try at least?"

Sirius looked so stunned, so completely out of his element, that he finally gasped, "You really think that's what Claire was trying to say? Because if that's not the girl she meant..."

"I'm pretty sure it's Audrey," Remus assured him. "I mean, think about it. Those two are basically inseparable. Who else would be likely to tell Claire that they're interested in you? Nobody else would have the guts, or enough of a death wish. You know how she is about girls who want you."

Sirius smiled fondly, probably thinking of the way Claire treated girls that stalked him, of which there were many.

"I don't know," he finally sighed, though. "I'll have to think about it. I mean, I've never really looked at her that way, and if it's not her... and... I mean, I don't want to hurt her. What if it doesn't work out? That would be a disaster, wouldn't it, James?"

"It would work out," James said firmly, but Sirius didn't seem convinced.

"All I know is that girl is far too good for the likes of me," Sirius said softly, flopping onto his bed.

Remus couldn't believe how strange it was to hear those words come out of Sirius's mouth, almost the same words he had spoken two years prior about Claire. And while Remus was fairly certain that he and Sirius were both right, he knew he couldn't live without Claire. He needed her, and maybe, just maybe, Sirius needed Audrey too. He just hadn't realized it yet.

They had done all they could do for the moment, though, and they all went to their separate beds and went to sleep for the night, Remus sitting up, wondering what the girls were doing with Audrey.


	8. Progress

Claire was sitting on the floor of Audrey's dormitory with Lily Evans of all people sitting on the bed with Audrey. She was virtually alone in a room with Lily Evans, and neither of them were trying to kill each other.

It was just a testament to how much they loved Audrey that they were willing to do this for her.

"I think Sirius might be interested in you," Claire said with a smile. "He's certainly considering it, Remus said."

"Please don't say that," Audrey said in a mortified whisper. "Please don't get up my hopes like that."

Claire and Lily exchanged nervous looks.

"Audrey, you know she's not just getting your hopes up," Lily said gently. "I don't know Sirius very well and even I think he's looking at you differently. That's what you want, isn't it?"

Her tone screamed 'Merlin knows why' and Claire worked very hard not to lash out at Evans for the attitude about her brother, but if she was being fair she really had a hard time seeing why Audrey didn't find a nice boy, someone more like herself. The problem was all the nice boys Claire could think of were either ugly or stupid.

And really, nobody knew Sirius like Claire did, and Claire knew that he had a wonderful capacity for kindness and carrying.

"Just give it a try, Audrey," Claire sighed. "We're not saying jump him, we're just saying that if he asks you should be prepared. All right?"

Audrey muttered and squeaked, but in the end Claire and Lily decided that Audrey was in the proper mindset and returned to their own dormitory to get changed.

"I think this is working out well," Claire said, pulling off her bathrobe and fishing for her nightdress. "Remus told me that Sirius has wheels turning in his head."

Lily didn't respond, but when Claire turned to look at her she saw that Lily was frowning at Claire's body.

"What?" Claire asked slowly.

"I'm... I'm sorry," Lily said softly. "It's just... I've... I've seen scars like that before and I... It's none of my business, but-"

"No, it's not," Claire responded coldly, pulling on her clothes as quickly as possible to cover her body. Why had she undressed in front of Lily Evans, of all people?

Lily was blushing slightly, still watching Claire, standing in her own pajamas. Finally, she sighed and said, "I know. And I know we've never gotten along, but nobody deserves to be treated like that. It...It seems I've misjudged you, and I'm sorry. I... I had no idea."

"I didn't want you to," Claire replied sourly, trying hard not to cry. She hadn't needed a reminder of her parents. She didn't want to be talking about this with Lily Evans. She wanted to focus on Sirius, because Sirius was a perfect distraction from their past.

"I know a boy," Lily said softly, ignoring Claire's discomfort with the topic. "He wasn't always the nicest boy and he wasn't always the kind of person I would have hung out with. But he did some nice things for me and I saw these marks on him one day... like yours. It wasn't too hard to figure out that he was being abused. It was awful. Cigarette burns on his chest, slices all over his back from being belted... My parents never hit us unless we were doing something dangerous. I couldn't understand. But I could see why he was so different. It has to change a person, being treated like that."

Claire shifted uncomfortably. She didn't want to talk about this, but Lily was looking at her with such pity...

Resigning herself to the fact that as she and Lily were now in league, the best way to keep Lily on her side was to do her part in meeting halfway, Claire motioned for the redhead to sit down beside her. It seemed that this meant opening up about her home life, but if it made her and Sirius seem more human, maybe it was a good thing.

"It does," Claire finally whispered. "But it sounds like your friend had Muggle methods used on him. Imagine that sort of pain and torture... but with Dark Magic instead of cigarettes."

Lily shuddered, but she didn't seem ready to end the conversation, looking at Claire expectantly, so Claire took a deep breath.

"My brother, he was the heir," she explained. "And in pureblood families, that means a lot. They needed him in good shape, and nothing ever hurt Sirius as much as watching me suffer, anyway. So whenever either of us did anything I was tortured. As long as they kept my face looking pretty, it really didn't matter to them what they did." Lily winced, horrified, but now that Claire had started she found the words pouring out of her mouth. "My father liked little as well as the sound of my screaming, except the other sounds I made when in pain. When I got older, a few years ago, he started sneaking into my room at night and torturing me in a way my mother never could. When Sirius found out about that... that was when he made sure that we ran away from home."

"You mean your father actually... actually raped you?" Lily whispered, looking as though she'd just heard that Claire had suddenly gained the ability to jump straight to the moon.

Claire just shrugged a little, looking away from the wide green eyes that were staring at her intently.

What she hadn't expect at all was for the pale, thin arms of Lily Evans to wrap around her, hugging her firmly, tightly.

"I'm sorry you had to go through that," Lily said, and Claire could hear the thickness of tears in her voice. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't be," Claire said awkwardly, patting the arm that was around her waist. "I had Sirius. I'm all right."

And that was the truth, in Claire's eyes. She would always be all right, as long as she had Sirius.

Being friends with Lily Evans was stranger than Claire could have ever imagined.

As soon as Claire woke up in the morning she was greeted with a smile from the redhead, something she'd never expected or imagined.

Perhaps helping James would be easier than Claire had thought.

"Sleep well?" Lily asked.

"Well enough," Claire admitted.

Truthfully, she never slept quite as well when Remus wasn't holding her, but she didn't want to handle the sappiness of saying that out loud, especially to someone she'd only loathed for years. Lily gave her a sympathetic sort of smile.

"The day will get better," Lily said gently. "Come on. We're going to miss breakfast if we don't hurry."

Claire did manage to peel herself from bed rather quickly and hopped in for a quick shower, coming back out and finding only Lily left in the dormitory, so she let the towel fall without a second thought as she pulled on her clothes, knowing that Lily had already seen her scars, the only part of her body which Claire was ashamed of.

"How soon do you think you'll be ready?" Lily asked as she put her hair in a braid.

"Soon," Claire replied, hastily pulling on her uniform, careful to adjust her stockings in case Remus's hand wandered up her skirt as it had taken to doing in Ancient Runes when they were both too bored to pay attention. After all, why listen when you knew it all already?

"All right," Claire sighed, running her fingers through her slightly-shaggy raven locks. "Ready to go."

Lily nodded, heaving her book bag over her shoulder and following Claire down the stairs to the common room where Remus and Sirius were waiting. Remus raised his eyebrows questioningly at Claire, and she just shrugged. If she had been standing in his shoes, watching the scene, she would have been disbelieving, too.

The four of them walked down to breakfast in silence, and the tension in the air could have been cut with a knife. They sat down and Remus said, "So, how did you sleep, girls?"

"Well," Claire lied.

Lily raised her eyebrow slightly, but then she nodded and said, "Yes, fine, thank you."

"Claire, darling," Sirius finally said, "do you know if Audrey's got her eye on anyone?"

Claire nearly spit her pumpkin juice at Lily, the question so shocked her, but thankfully she caught herself in time.

After swallowing, Claire replied, "Shouldn't you be asking her this? After all, I'm not Audrey."

"How very true," he murmured, grinning like the cat that got the cream. "However," he continued, "you do tell each other _everything_."

Claire froze, a bit too prideful to look around for help, but she felt absolutely trapped. She couldn't lie to Sirius, but she couldn't just tell him. That would betray her best friend's trust. Her only options were to ignore him or have a staged panic attack, and both were incriminating. The panic attack certainly felt appropriate, though.

"Honestly, Black, this is hardly appropriate breakfast discussion," Lily said with a signature Evans Sniff. Claire would have giggled, but there were certain things Claire would never do, one of them being giggling at anything Lily Evans did.

"C'mon, Evans, baby tells me everything," Sirius said, raising his eyebrows in mock hurt. "Are you going to deny confidence between twins?"

"If it disturbs breakfast, yes," Lily said sternly. "And if it involves a third party, yes. That's gossip, Black, and I'm not going to tolerate it."

He raised his eyebrows even higher, realistically this time.

Lily wasn't exactly a notorious gossip, but after all, she'd done her share.

Claire was genuinely interested in how this was going to go. After all, her brother looked ready for a match of verbal wits, and Sirius never backed down from a fight. On the other hand, Lily Evans had never lost such a fight, and Claire didn't believe that Lily would let Sirius have the last word. Claire settled herself in, pouring herself some water and smirking at Remus, who seemed to have come to the same conclusion, buttering himself another piece of toast.

"And I'm assuming you're using this authority to say that I'm not allowed to gossip, is that it?" Sirius said with a smirk. "You're Head Girl, so you can do that?"

"Yes," Lily said with a grin. "That's precisely what I can do."

"Well, then, I suppose James can just overrule you," Sirius said triumphantly. "And I'm sure he'd be interested to know whether or not his sister has a crush on someone. Wouldn't he?"

Lily blanched, obviously wondering whether or not what Sirius said had any merit to it. There were lots of nuances to being a Head, as there were only two a year.

Claire sighed.

"Just forget it, both of you," she sighed. "Sirius, please, don't ask me to break a friend's confidence. If there's no one, there's nothing to say, and if there is someone I can't tell you."

He raised his eyebrows at how frank they were being, but he nodded.

If Claire was being completely forthright then she wasn't going to back down for anything, and Sirius always respected that. Remus was smiling, and Audrey came down for breakfast moments later looking like she was going to pass out any moment.

Claire watched as Sirius's eyes followed her, both nervous because he didn't get his answers and concerned because she looked like death itself.

"Audrey," Sirius said softly, watching her sit. "Didn't sleep well?"

"Ah, couldn't get to sleep," she said sheepishly, trying to hide her face with her hair as she poured herself some tea and mixed in some milk. "Mind was running. I feel fine, though."

Claire raised an eyebrow across the table at her twin, whose own mind seemed to be running in that moment. No doubt he was having an inner battle with himself.

He cleared his throat, blanching a little as he glanced at Claire, who just smiled at him.

"Audrey?" Sirius said nervously.

Lily and Claire glanced at each other, both trying not to smirk.

"Yeah?" Audrey asked, a bit breathless, not daring to look up.

Sirius cleared his throat again, sighing, and he said, "Audrey, I was wondering, if you...if you don't have other plans, to maybe... Oh, I dunno, maybe you want to go with me to Hogsmeade next go round?"

She looked up at him with shock and for a split second fear flashed across Sirius's face, and the two of them just looked at each other while their whole section of the table held their breath.

"Did you just ask me to Hogsmeade?" Audrey whispered, eyes wide.

Claire crossed her fingers under the table, hoping Audrey wouldn't faint on the spot.

"Erm, yeah, I did," Sirius muttered nervously, shocking everyone at the table by blushing. "If-if you don't want to-"

"No, no, I do!" Audrey said quickly, grinning and breathless. The two of them just smiled at each other as Sirius realized she'd agreed to go on a date with him, and then their friends began to clap, making the pair blush even darker.

"What's up?" James asked, frowning as he slid into a seat beside Sirius. "What's with the clapping?"

"I'm taking your sister to Hogsmeade," Sirius said proudly, still grinning like a giddy child.

James dropped his fork and looked up at his best friend in shock.

Claire's stomach churned. James couldn't ruin this now. Not after all her hard work. After all, she'd made him promise, she'd worked to get his approval.

Surely he was just scaring Sirius.

It seemed to be working, too, because Sirius winced, watching James with unease.

"About bloody time, mate," James said with an amused snort. "Behave yourselves. I reckon I don't need to give you the talk."

"No, I think I've got a pretty good idea of what it would say," Sirius replied hastily, although he did look a bit paler. "Thanks, mate."

It took Audrey a bit longer to realize that James had effectively given them his blessing, but once she did she got up, walked around the table, and gave her brother an affectionate kiss on the cheek before returning to her own seat.

The love in the air was almost a bit stifling.

Remus grinned, putting his arm around Claire and kissing her lips quickly, still not being very big on public affection during the low points of his cycle.

The look shared between Claire and Lily was also a bit of an anomaly, but not one Claire found she was altogether uncomfortable with. Now that she and Lily had actually recognized the reasons for their differences, had accomplished something by working together, she almost seemed like... a friend, like the boys or Audrey.

Of course, this meant Claire would have to hold up her end of the bargain. James and Lily would have to become her next match-making focus, as against her will as it all was. Even Claire had come to pity Lily a little bit over the years.

The news spread quickly that Sirius and Audrey were going on a date, which made many a girl jealous. Should Audrey become half what her brother was, they were to be the new power couple, even with Sirius being disowned from his family. The irony didn't escape Claire that Sirius was interested in a pureblood and James was in love with a Muggle-born. Still, it wasn't as if that had any bearing on their decisions.

Claire tried to ignore the rumors as she went about her day, but it was ridiculous how these things became the focus of nearly every student.

"This is absurd," she told Sirius as she attempted to do her homework while he sat there grinning like an idiot. It seemed he was doing a lot of that lately.

"What is?" he asked, still grinning when she scowled up at him.

"The fact that nothing is being talked about at this school except for the fact that you're dating Audrey," she replied lazily. "It's as if everyone lost their brains at once."

"Oh, there's no need to be harsh," he teased. "Look, baby, you've always known that what we do generates a lot of gossip."

"But this is ridiculous," Claire snapped.

"It's no worse than when you and Remus started dating," Sirius reasoned. "In some ways it's a little better because I think a lot of people rather expected it. After all, James is my best friend, and she's a very eligible girl."

Claire rolled her eyes, thinking about how vague and stupid the word eligible was. After all, as far as most society was concerned Claire and Sirius were no longer eligible.

"I just wish people didn't stare and whisper everywhere we go," Claire finally said. "It's annoying."

"A bit," Sirius agreed, glancing down at her homework. Then he grinned again. "But you didn't tell me because you knew she liked me, right?"

Claire started, realizing he was talking about her breakfast-time interrogation about Audrey's crushes.

"I don't see that it mattered," she said stiffly, knowing that Sirius wouldn't let it go at that.

"Oh, come on," he teased. "You can tell me now. She's accepted me, so I would hope that she doesn't have a crush on somebody else. Go on, baby, if she didn't have a crush on me my pride can take it."

Claire just smirked, looked up at her brother, and decided to take the cruel route. She might regret it, but there was never any harm in making Sirius sweat things out a bit.

So instead of telling him what he wanted to know, she just shrugged, got up, put her things in her bag, and walked away to go to sleep.

"Claire? Baby, that's not funny! You get back here right now! _Claire!_"

She just kept walking, trying not to giggle too much or let Sirius know just how funny she knew she was being.

Maybe she'd tell him in the morning.

Or maybe not.


	9. First Date

Remus knew that once Sirius and Audrey were together that his life would become far more difficult, instituting the second part of the plan would be the next big thing Claire asked him to do.

So when she sat him down on their free period and began pacing the room he was not at all surprised, watching the way her legs changed as she walked, smiling to himself at the thought of how those muscles felt under his fingertips as he touched her.

"This is where things get really tricky," she murmured. "Things are going well with Sirius and Audrey, and that's great, but we made a promise to James..."

"You promised him?" Remus groaned. "Claire, what have I told you about making impossible promises?"

She gave him that grin that always made him forget everything he was meant to be doing and thinking and shiver in anticipation. She whispered, "And every time you say that," she sighed, crawling onto his lap and playing with his tie, "you always end up telling me that I managed to keep it after all."

"My pleasure and James's love life are two very different things," Remus muttered absently, watching her lips and swallowing.

"I should certainly hope so," she whispered, her lips hovering just above his. If he leaned forward, he would get to kiss her, but he might get in trouble for cutting off the conversation later. It was far too tempting, though, to just take his chances.

"Claire," he sighed, leaning forward just slightly, but she leaned back just enough to keep from their lips getting closer than a tantalizing brush.

"Not yet," she said, her breath tickling his lips. "What are we doing about James and Lily?"

"You're going to talk to Lily," Remus muttered. "You're going to see how she actually feels, since you have each other's confidence now, and I am going to ravish you."

She moaned slightly before getting off his lap and moving casually toward the door before he realized what was happening, but he rushed to the door, holding it closed, growling down at her as she blinked up at him innocently.

"What?" she asked sweetly.

"Why are you leaving?" he growled.

"Well, with the way you ordered that plan I thought you wanted me to talk to Lily first," she said, smiling at him.

His nostrils flared for a moment, about ready to be angry at her for making such a miscalculation and making him upset.

Then he realized that Lily was in class and that Claire was toying with him to get him worked up.

"You little tease," he said in his most dangerous voice, and she shivered, still looking up at him with her most innocent look. He picked her up, carried her back to his bed, and tossed her onto it, almost missing her giggle as he pulled off his shirt, crawling on top of her, capturing her lips in a hungry kiss while she adjusted underneath him.

At first, Remus had thought that she would be upset when he displayed his dominant side. After all, she'd gone through a lot of pain because of the dominance of her father, and that had been the extent of her sexual experience before Remus. He was worried of giving her flashbacks.

Instead, she'd seemed to have preferred when Remus was aggressive and dominant, and he could often get her wet enough for intercourse just by order her around in the angry voice he sometimes got before the full moon.

If Sirius knew, he had no doubt Sirius would be upset with him, especially knowing how fragile Claire was. But knowing just the way she looked at him when they did this, Remus couldn't help himself.

Remus tapped her knee and she spread her legs eagerly, practically exposing herself completely in the act, her skirt being so short and her knickers being so thin. He could already smell the delicious scent of her arousal. He was barely aware of growling low in his throat as he broke the kiss, focusing on the buttons on her shirt instead.

"Remus," she sighed, running her fingers through his hair as he kissed each fresh bit of skin he uncovered on his way down.

The sound of his name on her lips was still as fresh and wonderful as it always had, but there was always something about the way it sounded when she sighed it that made everything seem just a bit more wonderful.

"I love you," he murmured, kissing the marks and scars on her torso, the places he knew by heart.

She'd been the most nervous about him touching the remnants of her father's torture, but once they agreed that they were allowed to touch each other's scars without question, he found that the skin around these puckered scars on her were some of the tenderest places.

Once Remus had her screaming in ecstasy and he felt his own climax, they collapsed in the sheets together, curled up and sweaty, his lips pressed happily to her jaw.

"I guess I have to get on to the rest of that list, then," Claire murmured sleepily.

"You might want to shower first," Remus teased. "You smell of sex."

"Mmm," she moaned, turning to kiss him. "Maybe in a little while."

Claire had turned out to be quite a cuddler, and Remus rather found that he enjoyed the holding her after sex as much as the act itself.

They spent almost the rest of the free period curled up in his bed, giving Claire just enough time to shower and change before they had class, but nobody seemed to notice that they'd spent most of their free hour having sex.

Well, except for Sirius, but he had that weird twin thing where he always seemed to notice when they had sex.

Remus then had to tell James, who was working himself into a frenzy about this promise Claire had made, that Claire was working on it. He couldn't, however, manage to tell his friend not to worry.

The following morning, nothing seemed too terribly different, except that Lily seemed less uncomfortable sitting with the boys, Claire, and Audrey at breakfast.

"Morning, ladies," Remus said happily. "Have a good night?"

"Well enough," Audrey muttered, knowing that we were all going to Hogsmeade. She looked especially pretty in the dress Claire had no doubt chosen for her, and Lily looked beautiful as well. "What time are we leaving?"

"As soon as you're done eating, princess," James said with a grin. "If this good with everyone, we stay together and break for lunch, and then go our separate ways."

Lily blanched Remus knew exactly what she was realizing.

By agreeing to go out with the Marauders and the girls, she would end up with Peter and James after lunch if she didn't find some way out of it.

But she must have made some sort of promise to Claire, because she agreed to the whole plan with everyone else, although Remus could see Claire's lips turning up into a smirk at the corners.

As soon as they finished breakfast, Audrey finishing last as always, the seven of them left the Great Hall and went down the familiar trail off the Hogwarts grounds leading to Hogsmeade.

"It's a rather nice day for being so chilly," Claire said happily, lacing her finger's in Remus's, and it was true. Her fingers were more than a little bit cold already, and her cheeks were flushed from the drop in temperature from going outside.

"I think it's great," Peter squeaked.

They trudged along in a poorly-ordered mob of seven, reaching the village far quicker than they had been able to do as third years, even with the hand-holding and being leisurely about the stroll.

"Honeydukes, then?" James asked.

Nobody had any objections, so the group made their way down to the sweetshop, everyone pleased to be starting the day off with chocolate.

"I wonder if they've got those things that make you float back in," Claire said excitedly. "Those were fun."

"Those were slightly terrifying," Peter countered.

They'd tricked him into eating one, and the poor boy was already a bit afraid of heights. The sight of his own body lifting off the ground without his permission sent him into fits of hysterics that even his best friends hadn't anticipated the intensity of.

"We won't make you eat any more," Claire assured him. "Although you weren't very high in the air."

"You have to remember, Claire," Sirius teased, "that at Peter's height, six inches is a long way."

Lily rolled her eyes, but Remus didn't think that it was all failed, because by the time they got into the sweetshop she seemed to have been over Sirius's mild moment of immature teasing. And the way Sirius was following Audrey around like a loyal puppy had the other five friends smiling at each other, watching him throw extras of everything picked out in her bag, telling her that he really wanted to pay, even though he knew she could pay for herself.

They then went through the high street, eating chocolates and arguing over what to do.

"There's just not as much as when we were young," Claire lamented. "The post office is a once-a-year trip, Gladrags is boring for the boys, Zonko's is boring for the girls... And the Shack is just out of the question."

They all nodded in agreement to that.

"Early lunch, then?" James suggested. "We could all stay together for lunch, and then split for the afternoon?"

Once again, no one could argue with James's sound, leader-ly logic.

They all piled in around a table at the Three Broomsticks, and James took the group orders, going up to the bar to place them with Madam Rosmerta. Claire put her and in Remus's as they looked through their bag of chocolates and other sweets happily.

"It's much warmer in here," Lily said nervously.

"Lily, we're not going to bite," Remus said gently. "Just try to relax?"

"Right," she breathed. "Right. Relax."

Peter was picking at a burned spot on the table absently when James came back with a tray of drinks.

"Butterbeers all round," he said happily, passing out each tankard.

The best part about lunch, everyone decided, was watching Sirius and Audrey stare at each other.

Sirius had her hand in his hand and he just smiled at her like an idiot, and she just smiled shyly back at him. Even while eating, Sirius ate with his poor hand just to keep holding her hand.

"What are you two doing after lunch, Mooney?" James asked.

Remus just smiled and said, "Use your imagination, James."

Claire giggled, eating her chips happily. It was bizarre how that girl could go from starving herself to gorging on chips.

"What about you two?" Claire asked, nodding at Sirius and Audrey, who were still grinning and holding hands.

"I've got a few things planned," Sirius said with a grin. "But you'll have to wait to hear about it later. I'm surprising our little princess, here."

There was something in the way Sirius said the usual endearment the Marauders used for Audrey that was much tenderer than it usually sounded, and James seemed to notice it as well. For a brief moment Remus thought James was going to decide that he objected to the pair after all, but James schooled his face back to coolness and the moment passed.

"What about you three?" Remus asked, swirling his glass and watching as Claire finished her chips. "Where are you going?"

"I suppose that's up to Lily," James said brightly. "After all, you're stuck with our ugly mugs all afternoon."

Lily blinked at them, surprised at this gesture.

"Oh," she said softly. "We could go to Zonko's. I know you two want to go, and...and I've never really been. I guess I should see what all the fuss is about."

Claire and Remus raised their eyebrows at each other, but the James looked like he was going to die of joy.

When they went their separate ways, Remus led Claire off toward the mountains near the village and she laughed, "Do you think James and Lily will end up snogging today?"

"No," Remus said, grinning as Claire climbed over rocks. "Not with Peter right there. That'd be like making out in front of a bunny."

"You do realize bunnies shag like...all the time, right?"

She made a good point, and Remus just shrugged, leading her toward the mountain.

"What's this?" she asked.

"It's a little cave," Remus explained. "We find all kinds of things during full moon explorations."

"Nice," she muttered, feeling along the cool stone walls as Remus watched her take the place in. She grinned. "When we're done," she said slyly, "do you think we could perhaps go find Sirius and Audrey and spy on them? I want to see if they snog."

"No," Remus said firmly, although he was grinning as he said it. As much as he didn't believe in spying on his girlfriend's brother, his own best friend, he especially didn't want to do it on Sirius's first date with Audrey, as the poor girl would probably be all nerves to begin with.

"Spoilsport," Claire teased, sitting down on the cold, hard dirt floor of the cave. "Well, if you're not letting me get my way, you'd better have a very, very good way of making it up to me."

Remus growled slightly, and Claire giggled as he scrambled toward her, beginning what was a several-hour session of lovemaking in the privacy of the cave.

As they walked back to the castle, Remus apologizing for not remembering a charm to clean off their clothes, Claire was laughing.

"We just need a creative alibi," she said brightly. "We can't tell people that we tripped over a root."

"It works," Remus said with teasing petulance.

"Only on idiots," Claire argued. "Our story needs pizzazz, Remus! It needs..."

She struggled for a word and Remus smirked, pushing her against the wall of the castle, kissing her.

"We could just say that we got the stains rolling around on the dirt floor of a cave before I made you scream my name," he said in a low voice, and she shivered in his arms.

"Maybe not to my brother," she sighed, pulling him closer for another kiss. "But otherwise, I think it's a grand story."

They stood there against the wall of the castle making out for what felt like no time at all and forever all at once, until Remus realized that if they stayed too much longer other students would start returning in rather large numbers from Hogsmeade and they would be caught in the act.

"C'mon," he whispered in her ear. "Let's go inside and find somewhere more private, love."

They went inside and Claire led him along the second floor, looking for just the right empty classroom to occupy when they heard soft voices, almost like whispers, and they exchanged nervous looks.

Anything could be Slytherins plotting their next Death-Eather-wannabe attack. They pulled out their wands and pressed their ears to the partially-open door.

"I had a great time," said the voice that Remus instantly recognized as Audrey, but it was shaking. Her voice never sounded like that.

"Me too," Sirius said, and he sounded far more nervous than Remus had ever heard him, including when Claire had been starving herself and when he'd only partially transformed when they were learning Animagus forms.

Remus got the sense that they should leave, that they should not invade their friends' privacy, but Claire's eyes were alight with curiosity and he knew he wouldn't convince her to leave. Remus saw Claire mouth that they were going to snog and his own curiosity got the better of him. He moved over to where his girlfriend was so he could see as Sirius leaned down and pressed his lips to Audrey's.

It was surreal, watching two people kiss, especially two people he knew so well, even when it was a chaste kiss like the one Sirius was giving her. On the other hand, maybe the surreal bit was how gentle Sirius was being about the whole thing.

The pair pulled apart slowly and Remus heard Sirius mutter Audrey's name before kissing her again, this time with much more fervor, and he could see Audrey's arms snake up around Sirius's neck. Remus could only be glad that James was not there to see his little sister being kissed so as their mouths began to move, and Remus saw tongues touching.

It was both disturbing and hot all at once, and Remus wasn't sure exactly how he felt about it all as Claire pulled him away, carefully closing the door so the pair were not spied on further.

"Well, that was exciting," Claire said eagerly as they made their way down the corridor once more.

"Yes it was," Remus said without thinking, before he could stop himself. Claire raised an amused eyebrow at him and he could feel heat creeping into his cheeks.

"Oh, was it, now?" she teased. "Did you get turned on watching my brother kiss Audrey?"

"A little," Remus admitted.

"Hmm, wouldn't have pegged you as a voyeur, Remus Lupin," she said in her sexiest voice. "I suppose you have something you want me to take care of now, don't you?"

Remus growled as she pulled him into an empty classroom, wondering how it was possible for her to take him from slightly aroused to ready to take her right there in the hallway with a coy look and a few well-spoken words.

Thankfully, the kiss was all forgotten very quickly as clothes were removed and other things were brought back into the forefront of his thought, like the sounds Claire made when he touched her, and the way her skin felt under his fingertips, the way her body melted in his hands and the tickling sensation of her hair on his skin.

Better to forget the kiss anyway, and no better way to forget it.


	10. News

Claire brushed her fingers along the edges of her book, watching as they fell back into place after she gently lifted them.

No matter how hard she pushed them, they always fell back into place, and they were parchment. They were literally paper-thin.

She felt paper-thin most days, but she didn't think she would ever regain that ability to just bounce back with pressure applied.

But then, she mused as Lily continued to scribble an essay beside her, even parchment had its limits. It could be warped by water, burned away, even melted a little. It could even tear, leaving a broken almost-perfection in its place. You could put a bit of Spell-o-Tape on it, but it was never the same again.

She was even more fragile than paper, but not too much.

"Are you almost done with that?" she whispered, thoroughly depressed with the thoughts that were taking the brain power she should have been spending on her Charms assignment.

"Nearly," Lily muttered. "And you still haven't told me what you know about Sirius and Audrey. They're doing well?"

Claire snorted.

"He treats her like a princess," she replied. "And they snog when they think no one's looking. It's sort of hot, to be honest."

Lily smiled to herself, scribbling a bit more before putting her quill back and sitting back from her essay, stretching and rubbing her eyes.

"You know, that's a bit awkward," Lily said with a happy sort of groan. "You know, you thinking they're hot."

"Because he's my brother, you mean?" Claire replied, grinning. It was true, if James had ever seen the pair devouring each other's faces he would probably have freaked out in the worst possible way, maybe even destroying everything they'd all worked so hard for.

Lily laughed.

"More because he's your twin!"

Claire chuckled.

"Don't worry," she said, smirking, "I am neither a narcissist nor harboring lesbian lust for James's baby sister. That would be awkward on many, many levels. No, I just am a red-blooded human who happens to find two attractive people making out to be hot. I bet if you saw it you'd think it was hot too, or me and Remus." She paused. "Just don't take this as an invitation to watch Remus and me making out. You might get more than you'd bargained for."

Lily's nose scrunched up, disgusted.

"I wish you wouldn't...talk about things like that."

Claire raised her eyebrows. Could Lily Evans be a prude and...and a virgin?

"Sex?"

Yes, there was no mistaking it with the way the girl blushed and looked away with a stricken look. She was uncomfortable with the idea of sex. Maybe prude wasn't the right word, but she didn't seem to want to talk or think about it, at least with Claire.

"It's a bit vulgar," Lily offered by weak way of explanation.

"You...have talked about it with your mum, right?" Claire clarified. "I mean, it's not like you don't know the ins and outs?"

"Well, it's a bit different than having it!" Lily hissed, scandalized, eyes darting around to make sure they were well and truly alone.

Claire waved her wand to muffle their words, setting the redhead a bit more at ease.

"Obviously," she said dryly. "Look, Lily, there's nothing to be scared of. When both parties are consenting, sex is a wonderful, natural part of life."

"I know that," Lily snapped. "But we're practically, children, Claire-"

Claire snorted.

"We're far from being children and you know it," she countered. "I know I've certainly not been a child for years. There's a war out there, Lily. Wouldn't you expect we'd all grow up a bit faster than we should?"

Lily shrugged, but she couldn't deny it. The sorts of things they would see when they stepped out of those walls, the things they'd already seen... There was no way they could really be expected to hold on to any shreds of innocence in such a world.

"I guess I'm just nervous," Lily said slowly. "I mean, my parents grew up in a very different world. They waited for marriage. People aren't doing that anymore-"

"That's not true," Claire insisted with a laugh. "Plenty of people still wait for marriage." Lily raised her eyebrows. "No, really. Just because you don't see a lot of it, I'd be willing to bet James is waiting. And there are a lot of purebloods who do, because it changes a person's eligibility if they have a reputation. They marry young anyway."

Lily checked that her essay was dry before rolling it up.

"You think James is actually waiting?" she asked with a little smile. "Because he's a pureblood or-"

"Because he's that kind of guy," Claire explained with a shrug. "He's very old-fashioned, especially where it counts. You know, marrying before moving in, asking permission, making the first move, waiting for marriage. That sort of stuff." Claire decided to push this as far as she could make it go. "He's also progressive where it counts. He believes in equality. He would never treat me or Audrey or you or anyone else differently because we're female. His mother's a very strong woman, you see. She didn't work, but if she'd wanted to you can bet she would have done it. It just happened that her passion was in taking care of her kids. I'd say she did a pretty good job."

Lily nodded absently.

Claire smirked slightly, looking down at her hands to keep from being too obvious.

It was almost too easy, making Lily think about James in a positive light. The whole endeavor with Audrey had certainly made Lily look at him a bit differently, and he really had been behaving himself since being made Head Boy. Remus would be so surprised and pleased he wouldn't even know what to do with Claire.

"Well," Lily finally said with a sigh. "Shall we go to bed, then?"

"Yes," Claire said happily, gathering up her things. "Let's."

The two girls went to bed, each with their minds turning over the conversation they'd had.

The following day, Remus and Claire spent their free period together, first doing homework, finishing up the last of their essays and the like.

"So," he said in a low voice, growling in her ear, "shall we go upstairs?"

"Yes," she said with a smile, "there's something I wanted to discuss with you."

His face fell marginally, but he said, "Of course, dear," and led her upstairs anyway. He knew that if he was a good listener he might even get what he'd been angling for.

She had him so well trained.

They sat down on Remus's bed, chastely curling their legs under themselves and regarding each other, smiling, but both waiting for the other to give some sign. Finally, Claire decided he was listening and she said, "I think Lily's very, very interested in James."

Remus smiled at her almost patronizingly.

"What makes you think this? And don't be like James and say something like 'She's breathing,' because we both know that's bollocks."

"Give me more credit," Claire said, smirking, leaning back against his headboard. "No, she and I had a little chat last night. Would you like to hear about it, or are you going to keep teasing me?"

Remus assured her happily that he'd love to hear about it, and then Claire expounded upon her tale, telling him all about the conversation she'd had with Lily, as well as her interpretations of it, which Remus listened to politely, an appropriately interactive sort of audience. At the end, he raised his eyebrows.

"So you're saying you think Lily might be interested in James because of how she reacted to your incredible bizarre strain of conversation?" he finally said.

Claire clicked her tongue, throwing his pillow at him, which his excellent reflexes allowed him to catch easily.

"It was not bizarre!" she snapped. "Sometimes conversations just need to take place, and I'm pretty sure this one was necessary because-"

"Because Lily is somehow secretly in love with James and is only discovering her deep-seated affections because you, oh wise Claire, have discussed sex with her?"

Part of her didn't appreciate that he was making the situation into a joke, but part of her really enjoyed the lightness with which he was taking the whole scenario.

"So," he said, teasingly running his fingers through her hair when she moved toward him, "what do you propose we do, darling?"

Plotting had long been one of Claire's favorite activities. She and Sirius had grown up plotting constantly, and she'd loved attaching herself to the Marauders and joining in on their plotting. But this, plotting with Remus, had been her favorite way to plot for a while. Since he'd become prefect he had toned down his part in Marauder plots, and Claire had quite forgotten how good he could be at the activity. She would try not to underestimate him again.

They spent about an hour making their plans before they just got too distracted with each other to think about Lily and James anymore.

When they finally separated, cleaned up, and went about their business, Claire was feeling a bit lighter about the whole thing. She'd never really thought that she'd made James a promise she couldn't keep, but it had been a fairly daunting sort of promise to try to keep. After all, the boy had been trying for years and years to get Lily's attention. Granted, he'd never listened to good advice before, but still.

Now, though, with Remus's approval and a plan ready to set in motion, Claire felt like the whole thing wasn't impossible after all.

"You know," Remus said thoughtfully, "you never did say exactly when we were going to do this. That's sort of important."

"True," Claire sighed, thinking over her schedule, as well as the sections of the library. "I'm thinking give me at least a day or two to find all the spells we need and then we'll have it all worked out. Mundungus-"

"I still don't like that bit," Remus said darkly, but Claire waved him off.

"Mundungus will take a day or two to teach," she admitted. "But he can hide like no one else, and I won't have him do anything too terribly tricky."

"I still think you should go for someone better with a wand," he said nervously.

Claire raised her eyebrow at him.

"Who?" she demanded. "Peter? He's hardly better. And I can't ask you or Sirius. Neither of you would ever use magic against me, even for the greater good. Mundungus owes me, so he's got to get it right or I make sure he lands himself in jail for half his life."

Remus just sighed, muttering to himself that she was missing the point, but Claire hardly paid any attention.

She knew he didn't like her using Mundungus like that, and she also knew that he didn't like that she wouldn't just let him turn in the law-breaking scum, but he had his uses, and she was also fairly certain that Dumbledore knew everything and wasn't telling anyone as well.

"He doesn't know everything," Remus countered when they'd discussed it earlier. "He doesn't know about your being an Animagus."

Claire shrugged.

"Maybe he does."

"But it's illegal."

She gave Remus an icy look and said, "So's raping your children, but I'm pretty sure he knew about that and did nothing."

There was silence between them as they stared at each other for a moment, their faces softening at the same slow pace. Remus wrapped an arm around her and let her rest her head on his shoulder.

She didn't cry about it, not anymore, but it still hurt to think about, even when she was the one to bring it up. Claire only hoped that someday she could talk about her family without feeling that bitter, all-consuming hatred and pain in the pit of her stomach that made her feel so sick. She didn't want to be angry and broken for the rest of her life.

That night at dinner, Claire was surprised to find her younger brother, Regulus, sitting down across from her with nervous eyes.

"What do you want?" Sirius snapped.

"Sirius," Regulus said softly, still looking at Claire as if she was the only person at the table. "I...I need to talk to Claire."

Her heart pounded.

"Privately," he whispered, and she knew that whatever he had to say to her was going to make her feel sick.

"No," Sirius said firmly.

"Father is dead," Regulus rasped. "Sirius can be present too, but I do need to talk to Claire, and I don't think you want to discuss this in the Great Hall."

The twins exchanged nervous looks.

Claire had to admit, she was curious what Regulus was going to say to her. Sirius appeared to be against the whole thing, but he could tell that she was going to go, and so he nodded, following her as she followed Regulus out of the Great Hall.

The three of them entered the empty first floor classroom that was used for first years to ready themselves until the feast was ready for them at the start of every year.

"Speak," Sirius demanded.

He wanted it over with quickly, and Regulus just nodded for a moment before sitting down.

"Father wasn't well after you left," he said softly. "He kept getting more and sicker, although Mother would never tell me specifically what was wrong. She just insisted that you broke his heart with your choices."

Sirius snorted. Claire put a hand on his arm to calm him. It might have all been lies, but she wanted to hear Regulus out anyway.

"Go on," she whispered.

"He died this week," Regulus said, rubbing the heels of his hands into his forehead. "He... Mother asked me if I would speak to you because..."

"Because what, Reg?" Claire whispered.

"Because if I don't have one or both of you come back and take your place in the family," he said softly, "then they're going to make me join..."

"Regulus," Claire said, grabbing his hands and holding them tightly. "Regulus, you don't have to do this."

"Please," he whispered. "I don't know what Father did to you, but Mother... Claire, I can't leave like you did. It would kill her."

"If miracles do happen," Sirius grumbled. Claire glared at him. She wouldn't have minded her mother dying, either, but Regulus was distraught.

"Claire, please," he whined.

"You were planning to join anyway, Regulus," Sirius said coldly, putting his hand on Claire's shoulder. "Why are you trying to weasel out of it now by ruining her life?"

Regulus shook his head.

"It's not that I wouldn't join someday," he said softly, "but they want me to do it in school, and I can't... I mean, right under the nose of Dumbledore? I'm not mad, Sirius. I do want to live."

"Then why join the Death Eaters?" Sirius snarled, and Claire took a step back from Regulus.

Sirius was right. She had hoped that because of this pressure Regulus would be having second thoughts, but his fear was not joining Voldemort, it was doing it while in school. She felt sick to her stomach.

"Sirius, please," Regulus said softly. "If you don't want to join, then maybe Claire could marry Rabastan and-"

"No," Claire hissed. "I'm not marrying that awful man."

"Well," Regulus said slowly, "perhaps there's someone else-"

"If I'm getting married," she said coldly, "it'll be to Remus Lupin. And Sirius would rather jump off a building than join the Death Eaters. If you had any sense, Reg, you'd feel the same."

But he just looked at her sadly. Maybe he thought there was no other way, or maybe he really did believe in all of the pureblood supremacy that was being spouted by everyone around him, but Claire wasn't going to baby him anymore. She'd made her choice when she let Sirius take her away from home. She wasn't about to put herself back in the snake pit because Regulus had never learned to grow up.

"We're done here," Sirius said coldly. "C'mon, baby."

She spared one last look for her little brother and his dead eyes before letting Sirius lead her back to the Great Hall.

"What was that all about?" Remus asked softly.

"Nothing," Sirius said dully. "We'll talk about it later. Just eat your peas."

Remus raised his eyebrows, lowering his fork and glancing at Claire, who just shrugged sullenly, kissed his cheek and said, "How are the peas, Remus?"

"They're peas," he said simply. "How do you expect them to be? They're green, round, and a bit overcooked."

Everyone sitting there was tense, but especially Sirius. It was a good thing he had his back to the Slytherin table, or Claire was convinced that he would have been unable to fight the urge to curse their brother.

The meal was eaten largely in silence from that point on. Claire knew she would have to talk to Remus later, that Sirius would be too angry to speak about the whole thing for quite a while. Still, part of her just wanted to curl under something and not come out for days. The food in front of her made her feel sick to her stomach. And the knowledge that her mother was still trying to manipulate her life... Well, there was nothing that made her hate the woman more.

Still, despite the fact that Regulus had chosen his path and Claire had chosen hers, she couldn't help but feel that perhaps there was still some way, something she could do to save him from his surroundings. Try as she might to think of it, though, nothing came to her, and she found herself going to bed that night wondering how soon they would actually make him join the ranks of the Death Eaters, how soon he would have to sign his life away to an unrelenting monster.


	11. The Death of Mr Black

Remus woke up partway through the night to find Claire crawling into bed beside him. She was not shaking. This was no nightmare, but as he sat up to ask her what was wrong she put her finger to his lips and pressed a kiss to his neck, closing the bed hangings behind her. Claire crawled under the covers. Remus decided that as she seemed to want, he would ask no questions. If she wanted him to know, she would say.

For a while she just curled up beside him, head resting on his chest as he wrapped his arms around her. He waited patiently and listened to the sound of her gentle, breath dancing on the air between them. Finally, when he was beginning to get worried she whispered, "Is there something wrong with me?"

At first, Remus didn't know what to say.

After all, in the strictest sense, there was quite a lot wrong with Claire Black. The amount of complexes given to that girl by her family was enormous. Not to mention she was traumatized by being beaten, bloodied, and raped by her parents for years. Her self-image was so twisted that she'd tried to starve herself. There was plenty wrong with Claire, if only he knew where to begin.

"I'm not going to lie and say you don't have flaws," Remus said carefully. "Because we all do. Merlin knows I know what flaws look like. But I guess I don't know what you're getting at, love."

Claire lifted her head slightly, and although Remus could not see her eyes in the darkness he knew instinctively that they were full of fear.

"What if Sirius and I are wrong?" she whispered. "What if leaving was wrong? What if my leaving really was what caused my father to die?"

Remus knew it was bad, but he hadn't even imagined that it was this bad. Her family had screwed her up badly, but if she even had to ask these questions she was in a darker place than he'd realized. He sat up, touching her face and kissing her gently.

"Relax," he told her firmly, in his most authoritative voice. "Claire, you and Sirius did the right thing, the only thing you could have done. There is nothing wrong in leaving a place where people are hurting you, especially when those people are the ones who are supposed to protect you." She shivered in his arms and he pressed on. "As to whether your leaving caused his death, I don't know and I really don't care. He deserved to die for what he did to you anyway, love, and if your being safe killed him, he deserved it even more."

He could feel her tears on his shoulder and he merely hugged her tighter, letting her sob.

She knew he was right, of course. She wouldn't have asked the questions if she hadn't known he would reassure her of what she knew deep down. Remus didn't want to think about what might have happened had she not left home.

When Claire had stopped sobbing he looked down to realize that she had fallen asleep in his arms. Remus kissed her forehead gently, laying her down on his pillow and extracting himself carefully from her, tucking her in and getting up to go to the bathroom to clear his head before trying to sleep beside her.

To his surprise, Sirius was standing at the door to the bathroom watching him, waiting for him, with eyes flashing in the darkness.

Had he heard everything?

Sirius's head nodded to the bathroom and Remus followed him inside.

"Baby is upset," Sirius sighed, running his fingers through his hair after Remus had closed the door behind the pair of them. "I know that what Regulus said shook her up quite a bit. And I…I just don't know what to do. Do you think she really thought about going back?"

Remus hesitated, thinking about the panic in Claire's voice as she implored him for answers to insane questions that were plaguing her since the talk at dinner she'd had with her younger brother. Finally, Remus shook his head and sat down on the floor of the bathroom, hands shaking.

"I honestly don't know," Remus admitted. "She's worse than I realized, Sirius. What should we do?"

Sirius shook his head, pacing the bathroom floor, hands still shaking as he ran them through his hair every few minutes. Finally, he stopped pacing and turned to Remus.

"Do you think you convinced her?"

"I hope so," Remus said softly. "But you know how hard it is to convince Claire of things she doesn't want to hear."

Sirius nodded, exhaling forcefully. He resumed pacing for a few minutes before stopping and turning to Remus again.

"We have to make her believe," he said firmly. "She needs to understand. I can't let this happen again. I can't lose her, Moony. Claire…Claire is all I have."

Remus knew that James was important to Sirius on a level very close to a brother, but Claire was more than a sibling. Claire was the other half of Sirius's soul. It had taken some time to understand just how essential the bond between the twins was, but once he did statements that attempted to verbally express it were easy for Remus to comprehend, statements like the one Sirius had just made.

"What do you suggest?" Remus asked mildly.

It wasn't that Remus didn't think that making Claire understand was terribly important, because it was. But he was all out of ideas. They'd been stretching themselves to their wits end just to get her to eat on bad days. Remus could foresee all that progress being lost in the light of their father's death. And it just wasn't right, that the man could still cause Claire so much pain, even in death. Hadn't she already suffered enough?

"I don't know," Sirius said, sinking to the floor of the bathroom, defeated.

They got no sleep that night.

The following day, they still had made no decisions about what to do, and when Remus ran his fingers through Claire's beautiful black hair as she blinked into wakefulness, his stomach twisted at the pain of not knowing what to do.

She smiled up at him, though, as if all her fears the night before had never happened. For the moment, at least, the smile was genuine, and she pulled him down to kiss her with the sort of mostly-awake laziness that warmed every part of him right down to his fingertips. He loved their passionate couplings, but almost more he loved just quiet, peaceful moments of love like this.

"Good morning," she sighed when he pulled away from the kiss, her gray eyes alight with happiness at the way he smiled at her.

How could it be that this beautiful, pleasant girl could be the same one who had come to him so broken and afraid the night before? He didn't think she was acting, not so soon after waking, and she certainly hadn't been acting the night before. She rarely let even him see her so fragile.

"How do you feel?" he asked, nuzzling his nose against the lobe of her ear, breathing in the scent of her.

She shrugged the other shoulder, and although he could not see it he could perceive her doing so by the way the bed shifted with the action.

Well, it wasn't as bad as the night before, so he would take it Remus decided as he pressed a soft kiss to her neck just below where her jaw and neck met.

In spite of how much time he had spent exploring the planes of her body, in spite of how well he knew every crease of her skin and every contour of her figure, he never stopped marveling over how perfect she was.

He pulled away slightly, rubbing his nose along the curve of her neck. Her skin was so warm, even with his own elevated body temperature. Maybe he had warmed her in the night with holding her, but whatever the reason he enjoyed the feel of her warm skin on his nose.

"You were upset last night," he finally whispered, not wanting to upset her again. But they needed to talk about it. He needed to know that she was really okay, not just pretending. He didn't want another scare like when she'd stopped eating.

What was more, he didn't think Sirius would be able to handle too much pain for Claire. Between everything they'd endured at home and the things she had put herself through while trying to deal with her pain, Sirius had suffered with her. And it hurt Remus and Sirius twice as much when Claire suffered than it seemed to hurt Claire.

"I'm sorry if I frightened you," Claire said sweetly, smiling up at him. "I think I was just tired and upset that there's nothing I could do for Regulus." She paused for a moment, frowning slightly. "There's really nothing I can do, is there?"

Remus sighed.

He knew that whether or not she was telling him the whole truth, her pain, at least, about Regulus was genuine. She had told him a few times, when she babbled on through tears about her past, that her greatest regret would always be not getting him out too. He had pointed out time and time again that the only reason they got away without being drawn back in through legal channels was that the Blacks had another heir. If they had somehow taken Regulus with them, all three of them would have been restored to their parents.

"I don't think so, love," he said sadly. "Are you sure that's all that's wrong? You were really upset."

She just smiled at him sweetly, nodding, kissing him.

It was hard to decide if she was lying or not when she kissed him like that. It was hard to think of anything.

He moaned as her hands began to trail down his torso, one of them ducking under the band of his pajamas, underneath his briefs, and he yelped a little in his throat.

It was too early in the morning to think.

Before she had a chance to completely erase the conversation from his mind, however, the bed hangings were opened forcefully and Sirius frowned down at them.

"No sex," he snapped as Claire began to whine. "Not right now. Baby, are you okay?"

She raised an eyebrow. She must not have realized that Sirius was awake when she came into the room the night before. She had to have been very shaken up by the news of her father's death to be so careless. Remus, whose head was beginning to clear of fog, realized that she had to have been lying to him about being all right.

"Sirius," she began weakly, but he shook his head.

"Claire, you can't keep doing this to me," he said sternly, far harsher than Sirius had ever spoken to his sister in Remus's memory. "I'm afraid. I know you've been through a lot and I can't expect you to be wholly okay, but I don't want to have to worry about you hurting yourself because of…of lies from our family." His eyes were full of pain and Remus wanted to leave, felt like he was intruding on a private moment.

"I don't want you to worry," she said, curling up against him like a cat rubbing on its master's legs. Sirius softened, hugging her tightly, kissing her hair. Remus watched this and sighed.

She was playing them both, playing them well, and in this moment he could see it, but the minute she turned her charms back to him he would want so badly to believe she was truly all right that he would believe her every lie again.

How would they ever know when she needed them if it was so easy for her to deceive them both?

"Let's go to breakfast," she said happily.

She went off to change into her uniform and Sirius and Remus exchanged dark looks as soon as the door closed behind her.

"She's playing us," Remus said softly.

"I know," Sirius groaned, sitting on the edge of Remus's bed. "I just don't know what to do. When she tells me I feel like it has to be true, maybe because I want so badly for it to be true, but then when I step back from it, when I'm not in the moment…."

"I know," Remus sighed. "She can't even use the methods she uses with me on you, Sirius. She's too persuasive for her own good."

Sirius winced comically, but Remus knew that he didn't mind thinking about his sister's sex life, unlike James with Audrey. Speaking of Audrey….

"How are things with Audrey?" Remus asked, climbing out of bed and stretching, trying to think of anything but the way Claire had been touching him before Sirius had interrupted.

To his surprise, Sirius got a glassy-eyed look and a foolish grin at the question and sighed, "She's so perfect, Moony. I don't know how I didn't see it before. And the way she kisses…."

All right, even Remus found it too much to bear, thinking of Audrey's sex life.

"Right," Remus said, clearing his throat. "That's good, then. I'm glad we managed to get you two together."

They changed, each taking a quick shower before they went downstairs to meet Claire in the common room.

Remus saw her sitting in front of the unlit fireplace with a solemn, contemplative expression he'd never seen on her before and his heart broke.

This was what Claire looked like when no one was watching. So sad, so beautiful, so pained. Sirius, too, took a step back at the sight of her.

At the sound of his step back, though, she looked up at us and instantly her face changed to one of joy.

Remus shivered just a little bit. He knew it was a survival mechanism in the world they'd been raised in, and even Sirius could change his face quickly to some extent, but he'd never see anything like this before, in anyone.

"Claire," Sirius began, nervously. He knew she would charm him in her way and then he would lose track of the admonishments he had for her.

And then Remus got an idea.

"Sirius," she said happily, skipping over to him, hugging him tightly. "Ready for breakfast?"

"Claire, we need to have a talk," Remus said, gesturing back to the sofa. "All three of us." He hoped that Sirius was going to catch on in this plan. Sirius was sharp, but sometimes, where Claire was concerned….

"Remus," she sighed, doing as he bid and sitting on the couch, sitting so closed to him, and the way she looked at him as she sighed his name made the wolf in him stir and he just wanted…wanted…

"Focus, Claire," Sirius said, not quite harshly but certainly sharply, and she started, looking to her brother with surprise. "We need to talk about the fact that you're lying to us about this. You're no okay, and we need to figure out what to do about that. We can't help you if you don't let us."

She frowned slightly at her brother, gray eyes full of confusion and for a split second Remus thought she might actually cry, but Claire was so much better controlled than that.

"I don't know what you mean, Sirius," she lied. "I told you, I'm fine. It was just exhaustion."

"I know you when you're exhausted, Claire," Remus whispered in her ear. "You weren't exhausted. You were hysterical."

Claire turned her attention back to Remus, putting her hand on his thigh and looking up at him with doe-eyes and he had an urge to kiss her right there in front of her brother. How did she make it so hard to stay on track?

"Maybe you were too tired to really remember it properly," she cooed. "I was fine."

"I was awake too," Sirius said, almost coldly, and Claire froze, hand still on Remus's thigh, but her face was suddenly full of fear. "You didn't check like you would have if you were simply tired because you weren't tired, Claire. You were hysterical. I could hear you. Now we need to actually talk about this, and you need to stop playing games! You're not going to get better if you don't talk to us!"

Claire stood up, looking between the two of them frantically, obviously trying to decide who to focus on and get on her side, because switching back and forth wasn't working. In this moment of weakness, of indecision, they both were fixing her with stern gazes and she began to hyperventilate.

"Baby," Sirius said nervously. "Baby?"

But Claire didn't respond. She was beginning to sway as she stood, and Remus sensed the eminent danger of her hitting her head on the fireplace just soon enough to catch her.

He found himself kneeling on the ground, Claire unconscious in his arms, and Sirius sighed, running his fingers through his raven black hair.

"Well that went…badly," he groaned. "What should we do?"

"Hospital wing," Remus offered weakly, looking up at his friend, then back down at his girlfriend. "She'll kill us."

"Yeah," Sirius said with a nod. "But she needs it."

Remus looked down at Claire and felt his heart squeeze uncomfortably in his chest.

She did need it. Maybe she would thank them later, although it didn't seem likely. But Remus didn't mind. He was used to not getting thanks from her, even when she'd needed help.

He scooped her up in his arms, letting Sirius adjust her head and arms so that Remus could carry her easily and her head would not loll dangerously as they went. Sirius opened the portrait hole and the two boys carried the reluctant, but unconscious Claire Black to be fixed against her will.

Anything to keep her alive.


End file.
